Plume de Ville
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From day to day.
January 2009
January 1st
Happy New Year to you and thanks a lot for your visits.
Sorry, not yet translated. Translation in progress!
2 January
It's
cold
(-2 °C this morning) and grey with little snow showers.
Beautiful blue sky in the afternoon.
It landed
silently on a window box.
At the same time all the sparrows dived under the cover of plants.
It is half hidden behind the trunk of the birch tree, but when I saw
him it was
not the the time to move to get a better view!
Here it is
the visitor, that I see three or four times a year, without ever having
been
able to photograph it. In early December I had briefly seen land a
moment and
take off immediately.
The
kestrel. [Falco tinnunculus-Falconiformes Falconidae -] (Faucon
crécerelle).
Brown
clear, his head is dark brown striped. Its wings are clear brick-red
with
brown spots.
Finally
it is Madame, I think. With a small doubt, because the young immature
(unlikely at this time of year) are very similar to the female. We can
see a
few grey feathers on the head of this one.
I
could not see the characteristic large black bar on the tail or the
pattern
of the chest.
Mr
has a dark head, with a blue-grey tint.
He conceded two photos on its window box and then, nonchalantly, he moved and landed on the rail of the balcony, where he could see better.
But
not me! Harder for the photo.
This is the
first time that I see one so close for so long and it is amazing how
small it
is. When I saw it flying, I thought it was bigger. But it is smaller
than wood-pigeons
that often roost in the same place. It is the size of a rock-pigeon.
The female is larger than the male, weighing 220 to 300 g against 450
to 500 g for
the wood-pigeon. The size of the kestrel is 32-35 cm against 40 for the
wood-pigeon.
I
would
have liked to see it whole, but the trees hid it partially all the
time. And
even if it seemed very comfortable and very quiet, I did not dare move
and even
less open the window.
He
remained there, calm, turning the head, inspecting the surroundings.
Yellow
legs, eye surrounded by light yellow as the cere of its grey beak.
Then,
slowly it spread its wings and flew down the building, gliding.
In all, it remained only one minute on the balcony.
Complete
silence of the birds in its presence, the sparrows remained well
hidden. I thought
that they were gone, but after the departure of the kestrel, they came
out one
after the other from under the trees and fir. Obviously their defence
is to
hide where the hawk can not fly or enter among the branches the more
dense and muddled.
Of course it is the sparrows that attract the kestrel to visit the
balcony,
because even if it also feeds on mice and voles, sparrows are often on
its menu
in Paris.
But curiously, blue tits present (it is because of them that the camera
was at
hand and above all already with the good setting) remained at the top
of the poplar,
watching.
It is well represented in Paris, where they nest (forty-odd couples),
among
others, at the Chateau de Vincennes, Notre Dame and La
Salpêtrière hospital.
Ph. 231208
A little more about kestrels? Le CORIF vous propose de les découvrir à Notre-Dame courant juin.
Take a look at Cyril.
4 January
Brrr
... It
is increasingly cold, -4 °C this morning under a sky who
wonders whether it
will be grey or blue.
Brawl
in
the nestbox.
On
2
January, at about 11am, great! a blue tit decides to enter the nest box
after a
long time of passing the head at the door in the dance "I'll go, I wont
go?".
I
monitor the display of the camera to take a first video.
And at once I see two chickadees in the nest box. First, I think it is
the
entry of the female, very good; it is even better.
But
the result will show me that I'm wrong.
A
battle starts
between the two blue. I would have preferred to show you, for a first
video, a
quiet entry into the nest box but a battle will rage. I reassured you
that at
the end the two fighters will fly away a little shattered and out of
breath.
Fighting between two males or two females? I think two males because
usually it
is the male which looks for places to nest, likely to please the
female. And
you will see that one of the tits has a well-known head ...
It must be said that the fight is impressive. Seeing the violence of
the fight,
I almost would want to intervene. This would not be a good thing. The
fight is
normal for the possession and defence of a territory.
I often see altercations between sparrows, equally violent, but in a
small nest
box and close it's much more impressive.
Three times a tit accepted defeat and tried to leave, but every time the other pulled it from the entrance to the nest box on the inside to resume the fight.
We see it in the next to last photo before at right. One was at the
entrance,
the other brings it back.
We saw it from outside the nest, partially out, trying to get out completely, and then suddenly pulled back.
Pricking, pinching, the blows pour and down
flies.
The battle
lasted 2 long minutes.
Here are the pictures.
See VIDEO (3152ko 36s)
(AVI compression: Microsoft Windows Media vidéo9)
The
lighting was set during the recording, which explains the colour
change.
What do not distracted at all the combatants.
[This video includes the
sound and images are those of an IP camera and
not a webcam as in previous years. I planned to introduce the new
facility only
at first adoption of the nest box. I'll come back.]
The loser finally
manages to escape and fled immediately.
The winner remains in its territory and rejects a ball of feathers
after the
battle.
It is "blue eyebrow" who won, as seen on the small picture. I do not
know if it was the first to enter the nest and was attacked or vice
versa.
It will stay a long moment to recover and perhaps to savour its victory, placed on a birch branch. After a sunflower seed, it also left. There will be no other entry in the nest and we will not see them back that day.
I hope that the next video will be an entry of "blue eyebrow" with its
belle!
Since then, no new entry, but regular inspections at the entrance that
can be
identified through the detection of movement as a change of lighting,
as the
entrance is masked and unmasked.
5 January
Snow!
7 January
Brrr....
This morning 8h.
Limited
time available today, then just a small photo of "blue eyebrow" come
lengthily
to feed and watch several times in the nest box.
8 January
Warming:
0 °C
this morning. -1 °C tonight. The snow remains frozen under a
beautiful blue
sky.
An entry this morning for the small blue, yes, always "blue eyebrow".
Irrésistible ce ciel bleu.
Light,
snow, birds ... Good! A little too similar, but I couldn't stop...
On the one
with the sparrow, my watering can unfortunately sticks out, with a
"beautiful"
green spot. But I kept it because I love them so, a little pensive
(actually,
the sparrow is waiting to see what the tit will find) and we can see
the
difference in size of the two birds.
The kestrel did a passage at noon. We had a glimpse; the cry of a
sparrow warned
us.
11 January
Big cold
still on Friday: -7 °C at night. Since yesterday, a small
warming. -1 °C
yesterday in the day, -6 °C still in the night and 2 °C
this afternoon.
Let's
enjoy
for a time these landscapes of snow so rare in Paris.
The snow
remains frozen; the lakes are frozen (8 odd cm of ice). Freezing and
thawing
have kept the feet of moorhens and ducks carved between two layers of
ice.
Guess which way she went!
An entry in the nest box at 10:39 yesterday, a few seconds. Then today
at 11:30 just as brief.
Watch
VIDEO (258ko 11s)
[[The video is not very colorful, I left the camera in IR.]
Moonlight...
[Just to see what could be achieved with a so beautiful moon tonight!]
