Kites?

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Jdsk
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Re: Kites?

Post by Jdsk »

millimole wrote: 13 Feb 2022, 7:32amWe made some monster box kites, but these days I just keep a shop-bought frameless kite in my saddlebag in case I see a likely field.
Joyous objects.

Apart from the high-performance versions I usually have a folding kite in my rucksack... but not in my pannier. It seems to go better with walking than with cycling.

: - )

Jonathan
Jdsk
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Re: Kites?

Post by Jdsk »

"When red kites were reintroduced in England more than 30 years ago, young birds were brought over from thriving populations in Spain. Now the carrion-feeding raptor is doing so well that English chicks – with distant Spanish ancestry – are being flown back to Spain to boost ailing numbers there."

https://www.theguardian.com/environment ... ng-numbers

Jonathan
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al_yrpal
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Re: Kites?

Post by al_yrpal »

Here in Somerset I miss the red kites. We just get the occasional buzzard.

Al
Reuse, recycle, thus do your bit to save the planet.... Get stuff at auctions, Dump, Charity Shops, Facebook Marketplace, Ebay, Car Boots. Choose an Old House, and a Banger ..... And cycle as often as you can......
thirdcrank
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Re: Kites?

Post by thirdcrank »

Red kits are certainly thriving round here. I'm now fairly sure there's a nest in the trees on the M62 and there have been several times recently when I've seen one over neighbours back gardens, which is surprising as I didn't think there was anything to attract them.
Stradageek
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Re: Kites?

Post by Stradageek »

Loads in Northants, I recommend a recumbent bike for watching them swooping low over the roads :D
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simonineaston
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Re: Kites?

Post by simonineaston »

Not a kite (obs) but was excited to see and hear one of Bristol's urban kestrels the other day, whizzing in and out of an abandoned bond wharehouse, next to the new cut.
S
(on the look out for Armageddon, on board a Brompton nano & ever-changing Moultons)
Jdsk
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Re: Kites?

Post by Jdsk »

Stradageek wrote: 24 Jun 2022, 10:18am Loads in Northants, I recommend a recumbent bike for watching them swooping low over the roads
The first time that I saw a kite in Oxfordshire was on the first trip on my Windcheetah!

: - )

Jonathan
Bonefishblues
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Re: Kites?

Post by Bonefishblues »

Jdsk wrote: 24 Jun 2022, 12:24pm
Stradageek wrote: 24 Jun 2022, 10:18am Loads in Northants, I recommend a recumbent bike for watching them swooping low over the roads
The first time that I saw a kite in Oxfordshire was on the first trip on my Windcheetah!

: - )

Jonathan
I nearly drove off the M40 in surprise!
reohn2
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Re: Kites?

Post by reohn2 »

Bonefishblues wrote: 24 Jun 2022, 12:49pm
Jdsk wrote: 24 Jun 2022, 12:24pm
Stradageek wrote: 24 Jun 2022, 10:18am Loads in Northants, I recommend a recumbent bike for watching them swooping low over the roads
The first time that I saw a kite in Oxfordshire was on the first trip on my Windcheetah!

: - )

Jonathan
I nearly drove off the M40 in surprise!
You shouldn't be reading the forum whilst driving!
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Bonefishblues
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Re: Kites?

Post by Bonefishblues »

reohn2 wrote: 24 Jun 2022, 2:11pm
Bonefishblues wrote: 24 Jun 2022, 12:49pm
Jdsk wrote: 24 Jun 2022, 12:24pm
The first time that I saw a kite in Oxfordshire was on the first trip on my Windcheetah!

: - )

Jonathan
I nearly drove off the M40 in surprise!
You shouldn't be reading the forum whilst driving!
You're right - those parchment folders were a right pain bitd, most distracting
reohn2
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Re: Kites?

Post by reohn2 »

Bonefishblues wrote: 24 Jun 2022, 2:26pm
reohn2 wrote: 24 Jun 2022, 2:11pm
Bonefishblues wrote: 24 Jun 2022, 12:49pm
I nearly drove off the M40 in surprise!
You shouldn't be reading the forum whilst driving!
You're right - those parchment folders were a right pain bitd, most distracting
Especially the broadsheets :shock:
-----------------------------------------------------------
"All we are not stares back at what we are"
W H Auden
dodger1
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Re: Kites?

Post by dodger1 »

Thought I was seeing things last week here, near Helston in West Cornwall, but it was definitely a pair of red kites.
I'm used to seeing them in the Cotswolds and I know they have gradually extended their territory, but this was a huge surprise.
Jdsk
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Re: Kites?

Post by Jdsk »

How they might have got there...
https://cbwps.org.uk/articles/red-kites ... tumn-2021/

Jonathan
Nearholmer
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Re: Kites?

Post by Nearholmer »

Very common birds indeed now in the area I usually trundle about on my bike, with no gap between the Chiltern release population and the population that I think started with a release at Rockingham in Northants. They’re so common across Bucks and Northants, and the bits of Beds and Oxon that I get to that you can almost rely on seeing one somewhere in the sky if you’ve got a good field of view, and I wonder if they are displacing other birds.
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Cugel
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Re: Kites?

Post by Cugel »

Nearholmer wrote: 27 Jun 2022, 10:31pm Very common birds indeed now in the area I usually trundle about on my bike, with no gap between the Chiltern release population and the population that I think started with a release at Rockingham in Northants. They’re so common across Bucks and Northants, and the bits of Beds and Oxon that I get to that you can almost rely on seeing one somewhere in the sky if you’ve got a good field of view, and I wonder if they are displacing other birds.
Red kites are primarily scavengers so if they're replacing other birds, presumably those displaced would be scavengers too. On the other hand .....

The notion of "displacement" of one living thing by another may be a red-herring. The herrings, in this case, have displaced alternative possibilities that we might characterise as "the normal ongoing changes within an ecology, in which various populations wax and wane in reaction to all sorts of factors, including the natural pulsing of chaotic assemblages from one relatively steady state to another".

That "displacement" notion smacks a bit of nationhood, nativism and various other modern human constructs that the larger natural world may eschew. I know that we like to think that we can understand, manage and be responsible for the natural world but in practice we're just another element in it. It's "managing" us as well as everything else. It might be currently "managing" us to self-extinction, although the collateral damage is a bit drastic.

Now, you might say that distinct human intention and subsequent management actions ("introducing them") are the sole factor causing the increase in red kites. Do you think that a reasonable proposition?

Cugel
“Practical men who believe themselves to be quite exempt from any intellectual influence are usually the slaves of some defunct economist”.
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