Birds of Prey....Your Pictures Wanted!

And what did I take from that..... "Boy" LMAO I'm still young

That's just how we talk to idiots ...especially old idiots just to get their attention lol

Hobby & Kestrel at Rainham Marshes a few days ago

As you may be able to tell, it was one of those strange days where the sky turned blue!

My question on your other thread now answered Benji!

Can you see the rage in his eyes that he caught nowt lol

Edited: Stop press! I've just discovered the 'Measure Distance' feature on Google Maps. If it is correct (big assumption here) then the distance between me and the Kestrel is close to 200m!!! A truly heroic effort on the part of camera and lens to get these images.

Forgive the grainy photos. The morning was manky and drizzly, the Kestrel between 75 and 100 yards away, and the R7 has its own notion about what constitutes Spot AF - to wit a big blob in the centre of the frame.

Right, excuses out of the way, on with the show. A flicker of movement in the corner of my eye caught my attention, as a bird landed on a spoil heap about 100 yards away from me. Said spoil heap is a layer of top soil, clay and sandy gravel, dug out by Inert over the past month or so, to get at a layer of gravel (well, ballast really) with which to construct a couple three miles of footpath and bridle path around the Manor farm portion of the nascent Longwater road nature reserve.

Cropping out the bird. Various birders have told me they often see a Kestrel sitting atop the spoil heaps Inert have created, but this is the first time I've seen it for myself. Cropping out the bird. I'm not sure what the R7 was focusing on (it seemed like a fair sized rectangle around the Kestrel), but this is round about the best that it and the Sigma lens at 600mm could do.

After reeling off a few shots (at least I had the bird in the bag, so to say) I walked about 30 yards or so along the Blackwater valley footpath to the nearest gap in the trees. Any further, and the bird would have been obscured by an even higher spoil heap.

Signs of autumn appearing, with the red leaves to rear of photo.

It was pulsing rain showers, which would explain the bedraggled appearance of the Kestrel.

The bird sort of fluffed about, and looked around, entirely unfussed with the large, blue JCB digger about 40 yards from it.

The Kestrel was interested in something just below its original perch, and would hop up and down to take a look see.

Just so you remember how far away the beastie was.

It kept popping up and down for a couple of minutes. I never did see what it was after. Perhaps loose soil was slipping down making it think a rodent was to be found.

This was one of its attempts to catch whatever real or imaginary creature was attracting its attention.

Eventually, it got bored and flew off.

I legged it back to my car as fast as possible. A good mile hike. The heavens opened up, two minutes after I reached my car. Phew, lucky escape.

What is the small object in the trough just below the kestrel? It looks of similar colours ... could be just a stone or something.

This thing here?

Most likely a rock, but it looks like a chocolate covered Choux bun to me.

Roughly 1 million tons of inert material has been shipped onto the restoration site to backfill holes where gravel was extracted. This mysterious object could be part of this stuff that was smeared over the ground as part of restoration process. A small area of the site had always been reserved for gravel extraction once 99% of landscaping/groundwork was completed. This gravel (well, it's ballast really - part sand, part gravel) is now being used to construct foot and bridle paths.

The heap the Kestrel is sat on, plus the bigger heap beside it, will then be used to back fill the hole where gravel was extracted to build paths.