About a year ago a neighbour told me that he had seen what he described as a large falcon feeding on the remains of a turkey carcass he had left out for the birds.
None of our resident or visiting birds of prey eat carrion and the identity of the large falcon remained a mystery. Over the following few months, however, I found in my garden the remains of two birds which appeared to have been killed by a sparrow hawk. One set of remains consisted of a headless collared dove and the other the head of a starling. Sparrow hawks often decapitate their prey.
Peering out of the bedroom window early one morning during last Autumn. I saw on the edge of the lawn a large bird of prey tearing at the body of a bird with black leathers. It was a sparrow hawk, a large one and thus a female. Having seen the movement of the curtains it grew increasingly nervous and eventually flew off with the remains of its meal.
At the spot concerned I found the feathers of a blackbird, which appeared to have been caught by surprise as it was feeding on fallen crab apples. What my neighbour saw may well have been the very same female sparrow hawk. But it was feeding not on the turkey’ carcass itself but on a bird, perhaps a starling, which had been feeding on the remains of the neighbour’s dinner.
The sparrow hawk is now widespread wherever there is suitable cover, including suburban gardens. The bird feeds exclusively, on prey caught on the wing or snatched from the ground. The male takes mainly sparrows and tits. The female, which is much larger, seeks out bigger prey such as thrushes and starlings and is capable of killing birds up to the size of a pigeon or partridge.
Another bird of prey, the kestrel, can often be seen in Rainham and one regularly uses the tower of St Margaret’s Church as a perch. The most important difference between a kestrel and a sparrow hawk is that the former usually, hunts from a hovering position whereas the latter never does so.
During thc Winter months thousands of geese, ducks, gulls and waders live and feed on the marshes and saltings of the River Medway. Horrid Hill, at the Riverside Country Park on the Lower Rainham Road is one of the best places to watch these birds. The best time to do so is in the two hours before high tide when those birds feeding on the mud flats are pushed towards the shore.
Brent geese, which migrate to this country from the Arctic for the Winter, can generally be seen at Horrid Hill. They are small and stocky and are of a dark grey colour with a black head and white stern. They can be surprisingly tame, perhaps because, in the vastness of the Arctic, they rarely have cause to be nervous of humans. They feed chiefly on marine vegetation, especially eel grass.
The weather can be bitterly cold in Winter on Horrid Hill and many of us may be tempted to learn about the natural world in front of a television set and in the comfort of our own arm chairs. There is, however, no substitute for the real thing and, at the end of a spot of exercise and fresh air at Horrid Hill, one can look forward to a cup of tea and a piece of cake at the Riverside Café in the new and impressive visitor centre. The centre is open from l0am to 4pm during the Winter months.
