What are the chances?

Many years back, I saw a shoal of brook minnows attacked simultaneously by a kingfisher from above and a chub from below; the two attackers clashed in a blur of colour! But wait!!

Two evenings ago on the Essex marshes, me and pal, Mick Loveridge, were watching (through binoculars) a marsh-harrier wheeling around in search of supper. We had a fantastic view which revealed the birds colours and details, so that was pretty good in itself. The bird then 'stooped' into a pea-field and grabbed what I think was a rabbit: the prey was obviously large and frisky because the harrier was having one helluva job keeping hold of it - a tremendous sight! THEN.....into our viewfinders lopes a bright red fox which grabs the prey from the harrier! Howzat? The harrier was extremely pee-d off and after circling a few times went and sat on a distant post.

That must have been great to see Cliff!


I guess it happens quite a bit, hunters squabbling over their prey.. I saw a stoat and a buzzard fighting over a young rabbit last summer in Cornwall. Thought the buzzard was being mobbed by another rabbit at first (unlikely now I think about it), until I realised that it was a stoat going nuts because the buzzard was stealing his supper!

MJ: I suspect predators keep their eyes on each other for such opportunities; if I could see that harrier, then so could a hungry fox...why hunt when that mug-in-the-sky can do it!

A cartoon perhaps, Cliff?

Talking of that, Cliff can you mail me please, your mail is not switched on.

Apart from Kingfisher watching on sunday, and watching the way they work around the nest site, when I arrived home the day before my wife spotted something going under the bathroom door, her first thought was cockroach,she'd seen them in Crete.

Of course I get to deal with the creepies, so in I go and low and behold it's a tiny shrew!

So I trap it in a rubbish bin and tip it out in the garden.

Ten minutes later catching up with the newspapers, I feel a tickling sensation arond my bare feet and bugger me, it's another one.

Anyway after a bit of chasing around, it traps itself under my shredding machine, so a grab of the tail and a lift of the machine, and it's captured and released in the same spotas the first one.

Now sod's law, I forgot all about my camera until afterwards, so i'm not certain if they were a pair of Pygmy Shrew or young Common Shrew.

Sorry to digress a bit on your thread Cliff, but it just shows,if you don't keep your eyes open around this countryside of our's, you do miss a hell of a lot.

Done, Fred!

I'd better 'brush-up' (geddit?) on drawing cartoon foxes, Jonny!

Fred...are you sure it was a shrew? I mean...did it look shrewish?

Yep, no doubt at all about that Cliff, I've tamed a few in my time...

Sorry, I'll get my coat/forum/smilies/big_smile_smiley.gif

Quite a sight to see the Fox and the Harrier and it reminded me of something I witnessed just recently...

A couple weeks ago I was by the sea fishing for Mullet and Bass in a small lake/bay cut off from the sea by all but a tiny inlet. As the tide flowed out the bay began to empty and finally there was just one body of water left about the size of a couple of tennis courts and absolutely stuffed with fish that were trapped…I watched Gar amongst others whizzing around the surface and smashing into the shoals of tiny fish, then the birds began to arrive and it turned into an unbelievable sight…all sorts of species began to descend on the puddle…Herons, gulls, Cormorants, Kingfishers, everything…they went bananas, Gulls were diving down into the shallow water at the sides stabbing little fish with their beaks, they were literally smashing down into the mud at great speed covered with just an inch or so of water, it’s a wonder they managed to fly off after. Herons were picking off fish with the precision of a sniper, Kingfishers were diving repeatedly into the mass, the path of a cormorant as it went down you could follow underwater by massive “explosions” of fish trying to escape it…it surfaced with an Eel that must have been close to 2lbs and managed to drag it up onto the mud…I thought this I have to see as I guess we all know how hard an eel can be to kill and this one was longer than the bird. The Cormorant was pecking away trying to kill it but was getting nowhere the Eel was going berserk and thrashing around, once or twice almost making it back to the water..for 15mins they fought until finally the cormorant in what appeared to be total frustration grabbed the Eel and began to swallow it head first…what a ridiculous sight with the bird trying to swallow a fish longer than it...another 15min battle with the bird literally hopping up and down trying to force the Eel down its gullet until finally just the tail was poking out of its mouth and its stomach was visibly shaking as the Eel kicked away inside. The Cormorant then tried to take off, it took it ages and I watched it flying slowly out across the sea with heavy wing beats close to the water.

All the while the massacre in the tiny bay was continuing with leaping fish and diving birds everywhere, I watched until it was too dark to see ....it was a real privilege to witness.

i witnessed a mink and a cat rolling down a steep overgrown cutting on the shropshire union canal the noise they both made was unbeleivable as they left a trail of fur flying and plunged into the cut, only the mink came out a lot worse for wear but unlike the poor cat alive, none of us fishing knew who attacked who but if it was the cat it was a huge error.