Aha ! At 0809 BST this morning, eagle-eyes me spotted the first Swift of the Year ! It swerved and circled way up over the house .... but, of course ........ .... I couldn't hear it. This is the third year of not being able to hear Swifts. A sad demise. I've read that they stay for 100 days .. .. but I suspect that it would be less than that up 'ere in't North like . But here's the thing .... it is much harder to note the "last" one .... whatever the species. And my faithful readers ( Doris and Gordon Syringe) will recall an odd idea that I mooted. ( Mooted !! ) And it is this ... do our summer migrants lay eggs and raise young when they get back to Africa ? I mean, why not ? When they get there all the resident birds are breeding like mad. So why not "our" Swallows etc ? Even The King of Bryher didn't have an answer to that one. It was my idea, so there. © And I've also come up with an obvious way of finding out that doesn't involve trips to Africa .... surely, if they did breed down there, then their young offspring would most likely fly up to the Northern Hemisphere with or without their parents, and we would spot them, and ringers would catch them and age them. ( That massive picture up at the top describes the features of juv Swifts ... why the outer bits aren't there I don't know. ) So ... has any of that been done ? I've no idea. ... and talking of "going home" .... here's the music.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorThat's the author up there ... I was young and sprightly then. Archives
October 2022
|