{"id":3775,"date":"2017-04-21T13:28:24","date_gmt":"2017-04-21T12:28:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/?p=3775"},"modified":"2017-04-21T13:28:24","modified_gmt":"2017-04-21T12:28:24","slug":"a-raptor-day-kielder-safari-200417","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/northumberland\/kielder\/a-raptor-day-kielder-safari-200417","title":{"rendered":"A raptor day :-) Kielder Safari 20\/04\/17"},"content":{"rendered":"

I collected Luke and Louise from alnwick, then Alison and Neil from Kingston Park and we headed west at the start of a day searching for raptors around Kielder<\/a> and the Scottish Borders…<\/p>\n

We stopped at the southern end of Kielder Water and the ‘chip chip’ calls of Common Crossbill<\/strong><\/em> drew our attention to these impressive bulky finches as they passed overhead.\u00a0 With Willow Warbler, Chiffchaff, Chaffinch<\/strong><\/em> and Blackbird<\/strong><\/em> singing all around us we were soon watching Common Buzzards<\/strong><\/em> in every direction as Raven<\/strong><\/em> and Carrion Crow<\/strong><\/em> flew by.\u00a0 Then Luke spotted a large raptor circling in front of the trees…and there was a Goshawk<\/strong><\/em> \ud83d\ude42\u00a0 We watched as it soared higher and higher until it was just a tiny speck, even through binoculars, against the clouds. Kestrel<\/strong><\/em> and Sparrowhawk<\/strong><\/em> on the drive to and from Kielder added to the raptor total for the day and we crossed the border into Scotland for the afternoon.<\/p>\n

Our picnic spot brought more raptors; first more Common Buzzards<\/strong><\/em>, then the shrill alarm calls of a Merlin<\/strong><\/em> drew our attention to a pair of displaying Peregrines<\/strong><\/em> as Ravens<\/strong><\/em> flew along the ridges above us, Wild Goats<\/strong><\/em> foraged amongst the scattered trees on the valley sides, and even more Buzzards<\/strong><\/em> rose on the stiff breeze.\u00a0 Out on the open moorland Luke was quick off the draw again, this time with a stunning male Hen Harrier<\/strong><\/em>.\u00a0 As he gave directions to the bird, it was clear that the rest of us were watching a second male harrier<\/strong><\/em> as it quartered the skyline. A flash of blue was a male Merlin<\/strong><\/em> racing across the fells, a Red Grouse<\/strong><\/em> flushed from the roadside puddle where it was having a droink as we passed,\u00a0 and the air seemed to be filled with Emperor Moths<\/strong><\/em> \ud83d\ude42\u00a0 A low-flying Common Buzzard<\/strong><\/em> passed just over the car as we headed back into Northumberland and finished the day with Common Sandpiper<\/strong><\/em> and a fly-by Mandarin<\/strong><\/em>.<\/p>\n

Quantity on a Kielder Safari isn’t the game we play, but the day list is usually dripping with quality \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I collected Luke and Louise from alnwick, then Alison and Neil from Kingston Park and we headed west at the start of a day searching for raptors around Kielder and the Scottish Borders… We stopped at the southern end of Kielder Water and the ‘chip chip’ calls of Common Crossbill drew our attention to these […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[133,272,102,268,148,214,887,164,839,128,203,56,55,457,208,131,213],"class_list":["post-3775","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-kielder","tag-blackbird","tag-carrion-crow","tag-chaffinch","tag-chiffchaff","tag-common-buzzard","tag-common-sandpiper","tag-emperor-moth","tag-goshawk","tag-hen-harrier","tag-kestrel","tag-mandarin","tag-merlin","tag-peregrine","tag-raven","tag-red-grouse","tag-sparrowhawk","tag-willow-warbler"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3775","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3775"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3775\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3777,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3775\/revisions\/3777"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3775"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3775"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3775"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}