September 2025 Ramsbury Bird Notes by Paul Swan

Hobby

I think that the swifts left us on August 1st for their immense journey south. The swallows and house  martins are still with us halfway through August but will soon be off. On a walk to Bottom Copse, we  passed through a recently harvested field. The air was full of swallows flying low above the stubble at  tremendous speed and changing direction in an almost magical way. They flew very close to us, and we  could hear their wings just above us. There were also several house martins in the group, and they kept  returning to alight in a single tree, behaviour that we had not seen before.

Our much-loved robins are keeping a low-profile now. This is the time of their annual moult, when robins  must save their energy to grow new feathers. As we head into September, they will re appear with a very  bright new set of feathers, and a lot of attitude! They will be singing almost all day long, and not just the  males. In September the females start singing as well. These battling females are entering a male  dominated world and must fight for their own feeding territory if they are to survive the winter.

The 'Sighting of the Month' award must go to those who saw a hobby on the edge of Burnt Wood. These  fabulous birds are about the same size as a kestrel but easily identified in flight as they look like a large  swift.