It's Kingfisher Time!!!

1st December 2023

Kingfishers often leave their normal haunts during the summer months to find a suitable nesting site as they require a vertical river or a man-made Kingfisher bank. Then during the autumn they and their offspring disperse to their preferred feeding areas. It is only in the last week or so that a young female has returned to the River Ver in Verulamium Park and has been entertaining the folks walking along the footpath.

Unlike some Kingfishers in previous years this individual seems to be loyal to one particuar area and generally stays within the same 40 yards of river which makes life a lot easier. Here is a selection of the shots I took.

Certainly today it would appear that the only fish in the river were small Three-spined Sticklebacks which meant that she was diving fairly frequently and also fairly successfuly which can be seen in this sequence.

Great to see this fantastic bird being enjoyed by so many members of the public, some the first time they had seen one, with no risk of disturbacnce as they were separated by a river, and you can see by the photos that the Kingfisher was not at all concerned about the attention. More interested in catching fish.