Tag: Blackcap

Return of the Blackcap

bird sketches

Amongst the regular birds at the feeders late this afternoon, a female blackcap – with a reddish rather than a black cap like the male – which fended off the sparrows and blue tits from the sunflower hearts feeder but deferred to the robin.

It returned later and was the last bird at the feeders. By then the light had faded so much that we needed binoculars to pick out the colours.

Recent winds had resulted in the water level in the pond dropping. Yesterday’s rain topped it up to its fullest, overflowing level and last night’s frost froze it over.

High Summer

Ebor Way

It’s a perfect midsummer’s day for our walk from Wetherby alongside the River Wharfe, past Flint Mill Grange to Thorp Arch but we appreciate the shade of the Sustrans route along the old railway on the return leg.

wayside birds

Each bird has its favoured habitat. The song post for the yellowhammer in open farmland is on a phone line in contrast the blackcap makes a call that sounds like pebbles clacking together from the foliage of a tree in a deep, shady railway cutting. The warbler (willow?) prospects elegantly in the shrubs of a burgeoning hedgerow while the red kite swoops through parkland as we reach Thorp Arch.