Lovely photos. How far away were they?
They dropped onto the loch about 20m away but made their way to the shallow edge and came within 10 feet.
They’re completely at ease with human contact, I don’t suppose they see many, if any, until they arrive here.
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Unusually good year for cuckoos around here (& more widely?) - been the first year I heard three-or-more birds calling from different locations, and the first year we’ve had one calling from a tree in the garden. Still not an ice-cube’s chance of a pic mind, I’d rather not risk disturbing them.
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We get a lot round here at the edge of Dartmoor. Always hear them but haven’t seen one yet although people on the local fb groups put up quite a few pictures. Still interested in how they evolved to desposit their eggs in the care of others or if they ever do raise & hatch them themselves. When you hear them calling in early May, is that a male looking for a partner?
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Yes.
The relatively unfamiliar call of the female is quite different
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Good question, don’t know the answer, and I wonder how hard the behaviour has been looked-for, because the assumption is that they don’t (and that is by far likeliest), but there are cuckoo species globally that are not brood parasites…
Also in looking I discover the females do sing, but not the characteristic ‘cuckoo’, which is male only. I’ve never knowingly heard the female birds: https://www.garden-birds.co.uk/birds/sounds/cuckoo1.mp3
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Distraction technique to lure you away from the chicks.
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Do you know what it is? All I could come up with when Hel asked was ‘crested moocher’..
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It’s a Lapwing
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Saw quite a few of these on the golf courses in Turkey recently.
Hoopoe
Saw one eat about 10 small frogs at one sitting
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Mrs 68 just encountered this little beauty while out with the dogs. @pmac, tawny?
Perched about 4 feet above ground. Recently fledged by the looks of it
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Spring migration has been slow to date but it’s still early for Shetland.
Found a (fairly scarce) Common Rosefinch today.
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Had a few days in the Cotswolds, near Kingham and managed to get out with the camera one morning
Struggling to identify these, if anyone can help?
I think this is a Great Tit?
And these are juvenile Blue Tits?
Thought this might be a Flycatcher, though it’s caught a caterpillar
I’m stuck with this one. Can’t find anything with similar pattern on back and white neck. It’s probably something mundane!
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The “flycatcher” is a Chiffchaff and the last one is a Tree Creeper, otherwise 
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Thanks Paul!! Pleased to have spotted a Treecreeper
Was more certain about the Great Spotted Woodpecker and the Robin 
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Was in a loop drive today, out of Sort and into the high Pyrenees, average altitude around 2000m. Trak was marked “at own risk” and seeing this didn’t help. 
The culprits soon revealed themselves, at the head of a valley below a 2600m peak. Unfortunately the blighters didn’t want to get too close, the phots are the best i could manage. The last shot is awful, but hopefully someone can identify it?
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I wouldn’t like to guess at the identity of the last bird, based on that one photograph. I would say it looks very much like an accipiter but beyond that… 
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