One legged!

hi Rikey

   You havn't been slamming the door on them have you  lol.

  Seriously just don't know any chance of a photo

            Ray

Hi Rikey

First welcome to the site. I see yoyr from "The French Lieutenant’s Woman" area. Given this I see they now have new floating platforms in the harbour. I was just wondering if these banging together or the fishing line/nets have anything to do with it.

Robert

Hi it could be that the bird had some fishing line caught on it and slowly the foot has died and then dropped off. this happens a lot with sea birds. Alan

My suggestion would be that with the recent spate of freezing temperatures that some birds could have got frost bite in their feet and then they fell off afterwards. I know that some birds are susceptibble to frost bite when roosting on anything metal or at really cold temperatures.

Hi again

    Rock pipits and wagtails could be visiting the same feeding areas on the rocks or beach suggest a walk on the beach see if you can see anything

  Ray

this has been talked about before re why birds feet dont freeze, more likely fishing line.

Thank you all so much for your help. It really is distressing seeing so many of them with missing feet. It's by far the majority of birds that visit us. Is there anything I can do to help prevent it? Raising awareness? Beach combing for lines?

Hi rikey i agree it is distresing if you can find the address of your local angling clubs and write or the local paper it all helps Alan

Hello all, I live in Lyme Regis and most of the Rock Pipits here are either missing a foot or have seriously damaged feet. Very sad to see and a definitive answer is still unknown it seems. The birds themselves look healthy, so my take on it is discarded fishing line (which is far too common) or even rats, as they frequent the same locations. I may be way off the mark but it feels logical …unless disease has a role to play, due to the amount of dropped rubbish and unsuitable food laying around(?)