May 2nd – I had the camera, this time – although the light was pretty terrible. Heading down Green Lane late afternoon in light rain, I noticed a group of red deer near the brook at the back of Jockey Meadows. I gently approached, and saw there were at least eleven animals, some in moult, some not. They seemed content and relaxed, and tolerated my approach.
That was, until a motorbike came down the lane and spooked them.
A great sight on a grim afternoon not best suited to photography.
April 30th – This was a shock – I cycled to work for a change up the canal through Walsall Wood. Just past Clayhanger bridge, at the back of Maybrook Industrial Estate, a small group of female red deer (still very much in moult, the poor scruffy things) were browsing the scrub. This is an isolated patch only really accessible from nearby roads, but in itself, although small, is not bad for them as it’s barely touched by humans.
This means the deer are now crossing Clayhanger Bridge.
Watch out on the roads, folks.
April 24th – First of the year for me, spotted on the riverbank in north Leicester, these goslings were very cute. Not at all nervous of me, mum and dad were quite content to let me get close. They clearly weren’t very old and had cute in shedloads.
The photos didn’t work out too well, but I think you get the idea!
Now there’s a sign of spring!
April 23rd – A waiting game. Still she patiently sits on her nest, secluded in the safety of the disused canal basin in Pleck, Walsall. Her mate patrols the canal on the mainline nearby, and today she had mallards for company.
It’ll be interesting to see if she has eggs, or if this is a dry run. Quite safe in there, the nest is surrounded by fences all round, inaccessible to the public.
I love watching the swans.
April 17th – Awfully long range photos, but the group of deer were still on Jockey Meadows when I passed this evening – two stags and two does, looking very scruffy as they were heavily in moult.
I don’t think I’ll ever get over the fact that these animals now roam wild here. A fine sight.
April 15th – On my commute home, on the Walsall Canal. in a disused, fenced-off wharf arm off the mainline, a mother swan watches me carefully from her nest in the reeds.
It may look a bit polluted, but she’s fairly safe there: there’s a palisade fence and factory yard around, and it’s a brave fox would try to get to that nest.
Security. It’ll be interesting to watch her progress.
April 7th – It’s that bird again, at least I’m assuming it’s the same heron I saw a couple of weeks ago on the stretch of the Walsall Canal just where it turns the bend at Pleck and heads off for Bentley.
Here was there late afternoon, enjoying the golden hour. I was trundling home from work, tired. He posed beautifully unperturbed by me, or his competition for angling rights further up.
This bird is a star and I adore it…
March 28th – Even on the greyest days, Brownhills has signs of life at this time of year. I set out for a short spin on a grey, showery afternoon, and was rewarded with a herd of red deer at the old clay pit, a nesting swan just by the canoe centre and watered, and a delightful grey wagtail at Anchor Bridge.
It took me a while to work out why the young stag’s coat was grey and oddly textured. He’s been rolling in clay mud. I know deer like to mud bathe, but that seems a little extreme… anyone seen this behaviour before? Is it harmful?
I noted the deer were in moult, and wondered if the mud-rolling was a way of accelerating the shedding.
March 27th – This seems unusual to me – well developed Canada goose goslings near Heathtown. Bear in month this is in March. Looking at them they must be a couple of months old. Has anyone seen this before?
Maybe it’s a sign of a mild winter…
March 25th – As it happened, I never got to a place where the sunset was that good today, which was probably just as well as I was reduced to the phone camera with the main one flat. As I rode down the canal to central Brownhills, I saw a large dog fox run up the bank onto Clayhanger Common. Grabbing the phone, I crested the bank looking for a fox picture to go with yesterday’s heron.
Sadly, he disappeared into the thicket.
The sky wasn’t too bad though, so I took a quick picture, and headed home.
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