Beauty? on Mercury

http://www.swt.org.uk/wildlife/webcams/loch-of-lowes/  Wildlife cam Loch of Lowes

Whoa! Are they back?? I check every now and then as we await - with great trepidation! - the return of the great, the legendary Lady of Lowes for one more season... seems like to much to ask for, but one always has hope.

Back in March, I hope she comes back too Bobbie. She went through a lot last season.

http://www.swt.org.uk/wildlife/webcams/loch-of-lowes/  Wildlife cam Loch of Lowes

http://www.rspb.org.uk/community/ Bobbie, here's something you may enjoy.

http://www.werkgroepslechtvalk.nl/ccms.104.Werkgroepslechtvalk.LIVEBEELDEN.html

[Update]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V2fpgpanZAw#ws

Here's the story:

Back in June, The Eastsider posted a story about the new OK Go music video and its unexpected feathered guest star, Maria, a goose that hangs out at Echo Park Lake. Since then, Maria has shown up on her own YouTube videos and now, like everyone else,  has a Facebook page, reports Jenny Burman at the Chicken Corner blog. But on Facebook, Maria is known as Orange Bill, which was the nickname the OK Go crew gave her during the video shoot at Echo Park Lake, according to video producer Shirley Moyers.

Maria – AKA Orange Bill – has so far attracted 2,289 Facebook followers, some of whom have dubbed her OK Goose

If you watch the video, Maria is pretty much in every shot. So cute and now she's a star.

Update, story and a cute video of Maria and her best friend. (A must see)

http://www.theeastsiderla.com/2011/02/will-a-custody-battle-break-out-over-an-echo-park-lake-goose-named-maria/

Nothing more beautiful than a Cardinal on a snow branch

Courtesy of York Daily Record

http://middletown.patch.com/articles/view-finder-rare-owl-sightings-at-sachuest-point-call-in-bird-watchers-near-and-far#photo-4798792 Nice photos

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6pUA2JV1bx8# A quick video of approx 3 million Barn Swallows in S. Africa

It seems holidays to the East Coast are for the birds. About 3-million of them fly in every year.

The Barn Swallow, or the European Swallow, weighs in at only 18g, but flies well over 12 000km in search of an endless summer.

They will be here for another month, before beginning the long journey north.

It's nearing peak swallow season in the Lake Victoria wetland area, which is close to King Shaka International.

Every evening just before sunset, the swallows mass together and swoop over the wetland, before descending into the reeds to roost.

[!!! Tonga from MEC has been spotted in Port Huron Mi, USA.February 02, 2011 - Mississauga - Executive CentreCPF Postmaster Reports:]

http://www.peregrine-foundation.ca/w/2011/02/sightings/ely2008-chick-on-site-in-cleveland/ Ely,2008 Chick On Site In Cleveland

Great pics by Chad & Chris

!!! Tonga from MEC has been spotted in Port Huron Mi, USA.
February 02, 2011 - Mississauga - Executive Centre
CPF Postmaster Reports:

With a huge thank you to Mark Robinson from Port Huron in Mich. USA, we have some interesting news about Tonga, who was produced at the MEC nest site back in 2003. After closer inspection of the great photo he sent into us, the band number was confirmed to be a solid Black band, 85 over H. Our banding records confirm that it is in fact Tonga from the MEC nest site, who was produced in 2003.
Mark writes:
I came across a banded adult Peregrine Falcon on the banks of the St
Clair River, Port Huron, Mi, last weekend.

I’ve attached a cropped image showing the only photograph I managed to
get that shows the bands. It looks to my untrained eye that the band
on the left leg is black and contains the characters 05 (85) above
the character H, with no line between the characters. Is that
sufficient information to identify the bird?

I hope this information might be useful to you and your ongoing
research. If you are able to identify the bird I would love to hear
it’s story and perhaps write a little about it, and the work you do on
my blog

best regards
Mark R.

Jack Still Doing Double Duty
February 11, 2011 - Greater Toronto - Private Residential 1
Frank Butson Reports:


Most of January and February,the “resident maleâ€�  Jack has been seen with the resident female fairly regularily. The female has been around the old nestledge.  Recently,Mom was seen in some kind of altercation/chase with a large bird and arrived back on site safely. Stay tuned,historically,late  February has been courtship/mating time.

Egg #3!!!    

No way, I need to catch up on my cams. Oh thank you Kris!

   Dots... brings back memories of my pics before I had the spotting scope!

Absolutely MAK, now you have real Pictures! That was funny!

Margaret, your Winnie was special. Birds are very very smart. I lost a few of them too, sheesh, I wish they lived forever. Thank you for sharing your story with us. Everyone has a pet story and when they leave us, they leave a scar. 

I'm very sorry to hear about your loss, Donna...we lost a kitty to kidney failure a couple of years ago; it was in an early stage when they caught it, so we learned to do the fluids ourselves, but she never liked it!  She made it to 18 1/2, so I can't complain about the length of her life, but it was still terrible to lose her.  And making the final decision was horrible; like you, we decided the time had come when she finally went off to hide and was no longer social...up to that point even when she was too weak to jump into my lap she'd still make the effort, and I'd pick her up and put her down gently.

She was a special cat, and I still miss her after several years.

Take good care of yourself and Sam.

Patti, Bucca's sister, Shadow was diagnosed 2 yrs ago with Kidney failure. He told Mark put her down now. Mark refused, took her home and fed her what she wanted to eat. She was thin also. Took her to another vet who said yes, she is in failure, gave him a few meds, no fluids and she is still alive today. I don't get it but anyway, wow your cat lived a long life and you did good by her. When they hide, we know and they know. Thank you.

do I see 2 white dots?