Looking for the Goshawk by Conor Mark Jameson

Author:Conor Mark Jameson
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Published: 2013-03-14T16:00:00+00:00

Wednesday

It’s been another useful exercise to go through, but the feather saga has left me a little deflated. But I also have renewed determination to thoroughly explore some other scraps of woodland close by. And so on this wet Wednesday evening I park up, jump a gate and make my way across a patch of heath, Rabbits scattering in advance of me, bolting for the brambles, Bracken and burrows. Swifts are still present with Swallows and martins, but will be off again any day now.

The tall pines beyond are widely spaced, laced with birch and mature oaks. The bracken stands thick and tall between them, a stout latticework of fresh green. Below the sycamores there is less growth, more space to manoeuvre. It is easier to scan for debris. The warm and damp evening produces everything a wandering or even a resident Goshawk might need – mature pines, widely spaced, a fire break beneath a pylon, pigeons and Rabbits by the dozen, and, best of all, the slow but steady arrival of trailing flocks of Rooks and Jackdaws, and no doubt the odd Carrion Crow, merging together into a spectacular, clamorous roost of what I estimated must be a thousand birds. From time to time something spooks them, real or imagined, igniting a nail bomb of corvids from within the canopy.

I pick up the odd pigeon and crow feather, Rabbit skull and leg bone, with traces of matted fur. I find devoured crow, showing the tell-tale pale wing patches of juvenile feathering, below an oak. Nothing conclusive. Jays squall, woodpeckers clack, and Magpies provide a thriller soundtrack rattle of consternation. I think it is only me that they are objecting to, but who knows what else might be lurking between the boughs of these dense old trees. But if the Goshawk is out there, I can find little definite trace of it.

My spirits are raised when Mick lets me know how the Gos breeding season has gone in his study area in north-east Scotland.

“This year was eventful. I missed out on much of the Goshawk breeding season due to family illness. We had a slight population increase but very poor nest success. About a fifth failed – probably a consequence of the bad winter, though persecution and timber operations got some – but average brood size. About 75 young fledged – enough to fuel additional population increase next year. I’m now searching remaining woodland for evidence of birds – mainly dropped body feathers, but occasionally I get a new nest.”

“We search in the vicinity of Pheasant release pens because this is where many Goshawks get food in September. There is one pen containing about a thousand poults, which is being used by five Buzzards and three Goshawks. Losses of poults to raptors are of little consequence – this release pens contain over 5,000 birds and, post release, he can lose up to a hundred in one night when the combine harvesters are working after dark. Not all keepers take such a pragmatic view about raptor predation.

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