Tweet of the Day

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Sparrowhawk Jul 19, 2013

Show notes

Tweet of the Day is a series of fascinating stories about our British birds inspired by their calls and songs. Steve Backshall presents the sparrowhawk.

A garden visit from a sparrowhawk can be an exciting affair. They're smash-and grab raiders, using bushes, hedgerows and fences as cover to take their victims by surprise. Males are blue-grey above, with a striking rusty-orange chest and are smaller than the brown females - this allows the pair to take a wide range of prey.

Spotted flycatcher Jul 18, 2013

Show notes

Tweet of the Day is a series of fascinating stories about our British birds inspired by their calls and songs. Steve Backshall presents the spotted flycatcher.

Spotted flycatchers may be rather plain-looking but they're full of character and they often nest in our gardens. The first sign that one's about may be a pale shape darting out from a tree to pluck a fly in mid-air with an audible snap of its bill.

Cirl Bunting Jul 17, 2013

Show notes

Tweet of the Day is a series of fascinating stories about our British birds inspired by their calls and songs. Steve Backshall presents the cirl bunting.

Cirl buntings are related to yellowhammers and look rather like them, but the male cirl bunting has a black throat and a greenish chest-band.

Their rattling song may evoke memories of warm dry hillsides in France or Italy. Cirl buntings are Mediterranean birds more at home in olive groves than chilly English hedgerows. Here at the north-western edge of their range, most of our cirl buntings live near the coast in south Devon where they breed in hedgerows on farmland .

Kingfisher Jul 16, 2013

Show notes

Tweet of the Day is a series of fascinating stories about our British birds inspired by their calls and songs. Steve Backshall presents the kingfisher.

The Ancient Greeks knew the kingfisher as Halcyon and believed that the female built her nest on the waves, calming the seas while she brooded her eggs: hence the expression Halcyon days, which we use now for periods of tranquillity.

Kingfishers can bring in over 100 fish a day to their large broods and the resulting collection of bones and offal produces a stench that doesn't match the bird's attractive appearance.

Herring Gull Jul 15, 2013

Show notes

Tweet of the Day is a series of fascinating stories about our British birds inspired by their calls and songs. Steve Backshall presents the herring gull.

Herring gulls now regularly breed inland and that's because of the way we deal with our refuse. Since the Clean Air Acts of 1956 banned the burning of refuse at rubbish tips, the birds have been able to cash in on the food that we reject: And our throwaway society has provided them a varied menu. We've also built reservoirs around our towns on which they roost, and we've provided them with flat roofs which make perfect nest sites.

Tree Pipit Jul 12, 2013

Show notes

Tweet of the Day is a series of fascinating stories about our British birds inspired by their calls and songs. Steve Backshall presents the tree pipit.

Tree pipits are small brown birds without any bright colours or distinctive features; but you can identify one from a distance when it is singing, because it has a very obvious display flight. The male bird sings from April to the end of July, launching himself from a treetop perch, then parachutes downwards like a paper dart.

Coal Tit Jul 11, 2013

Show notes

Tweet of the Day is a series of fascinating stories about our British birds inspired by their calls and songs. Steve Backshall presents the coal tit.

Coal tits often visit our bird-tables but don't hang around. They dart off with food to hide it in crevices and crannies. What the bird is doing is hiding or cache-ing food to be eaten later. Coal tits are smaller than their relatives and have lower fat reserves, so they store food to compensate for any future shortages. In the winter they store seeds and in summer they will hide small insects.

House Martin Jul 10, 2013

Show notes

Tweet of the Day is a series of fascinating stories about our British birds inspired by their calls and songs. Steve Backshall presents the house martin.

House martins are often confused with swallows , but look shorter-tailed and lack the rusty throats. They're compact birds which build their with pellets of mud under our eaves and although they're so familiar to us in summer, we still can't be certain where they spend the winter. Ornithologists believe that they may spend our winter catching insects high over African rainforests.

Corncrake Jul 09, 2013

Show notes

Tweet of the Day is a series of fascinating stories about our British birds inspired by their calls and songs. Steve Backshall presents the corncrake.

The rasping repeated call of the corncrake was once a familiar sound of hay meadows throughout the UK. However these birds were no match for mechanical mowers which destroyed their nests and they're now mainly found in the north and west where conservation efforts are bringing them back to lush meadows and crofts.

Osprey Jul 08, 2013

Show notes

Tweet of the Day is a series of fascinating stories about our British birds inspired by their calls and songs.

Steve Backshall presents the osprey. Ospreys are fish-eaters and the sight of one of these majestic birds plunging feet first to catch its prey is a sight to cherish. The return of the ospreys is one of the great UK conservation stories. After extinction through egg-collecting and shooting in the 19th and early 20th centuries, birds returned in the 1950s and have responded well to protection.

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