A summer with Eurasian Hobbies
These agile falcons are skilled hunters that arrive here to the UK in the spring. Mostly found in the countryside, with large woodlands and heathland, several pairs breed within the London area and I’m fortunate enough to have discovered a pair nesting in a woodland park near me for the past few years. Having them so close to home, meant I could observe a lot of their behaviour and in turn I was able to have plenty of photographic opportunities.
The Hobby is similar in looks and features to a peregrine, but has a unique hunting style among other birds of prey. While watching them, I’ve been able to observe them hunting dragonflies, small birds and even moths and bats at dusk! This hunting is all done on the wing so tracking them can be difficult, especially with the speed at which they hunt. But the last half of summer usually proved to be the most successful as the chicks had fledged and meant locating them wasn’t that difficult. The young would be calling really load, so all I had to do was follow the sound. They would usually be up in the trees, either perched together or in a few trees apart.
Here’s one of the juveniles I found perched in a small clump of pines. It was on a windy day, but that didn’t stop the Hobbies from actively hunting and feeding their fledglings.
The two shots above were when the female flew to it’s favourite tree and landed on one of the lower branches. The good thing was that it was occupied with plucking a recently caught goldfinch, this meant it wasn’t really bothered with me standing right underneath it and I had some fantastic views as it fed in the foliage.
So far, I’ve been watching this pair for two years now (although they may have bred previoulsy as I had sighted them a few times during the autumns before) and they have raised five chicks to fledging and leaving the park! Hopefully most of them survived the migration to Western Africa, and I’m looking forward to their return, next year.