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THE SPARROWHAWK on its regular beat across the end of the garden sends the Fantail pigeons circling again. They turn and head over the wood. After a minute or so they emerge again from behind the trees, this time accompanied by a flock of thirty Wood Pigeons.On Sunday we saw the remains of a kill; a wood pigeon had been plucked. Its breast feathers lay in a circle beneath branches at the far side of the stream. The carcass lay there almost like an oven-ready bird in a supermarket, with a few bites taken from the pink meat of the breast. We assumed it had been the victim of a Fox, as we smelt fox a little further along the path, but wood pigeon is certainly on the menu for the sparrowhawk.
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For a while I was concerned that the sparrowhawk might have taken one of the fantails, as only three of the four were flying around. Later I noticed that the fourth seems to be spending most of its time in the barrel nestbox.