Just had a sparrowhawk attempt to fly into the house (we’ve a large window the full height of the house with windows opposite so it looks like there’s a path through), fortunately it didn’t fly into the glass but settled down long enough that I could get a shot of it.

No idea what it was chasing if anything, I just saw it “air brake” and flutter around in front of the window.

Very cool! One sits on the garden fence from time to time, everything goes quiet…

One visited my back garden for a feed last week..

Have had one visit on occasion. Sits in a tree and then swoops down on something, then clears off.

Though neighbours have removed the hedge where all the sparrows live so maybe it won’t return.

we had one just drop out of the hedge onto an unsuspecting female blackbird, her mate went nuts around it! with his attention on the male the female managed to escape!

We put maple leaf decals on our glass gable end after a Green Finch killed itself trying to avoid the Sparrohawk.
They are almost transparent from the inside but birds can see them.
Worked so far.

Just seen two of them dogfighting over the end of Leith Links, pretty impressive sight in the sunshine

According to the south scotland raptor study group it’s a very good vole year so raptor numbers are up. Not sure sparrowhawks eat voles mind. Perhaps on a evening out.

There’s a footpath near Lacock that runs round the perimeter of the Duchess of Cornwall’s house, it’s a long straight section that’s to all intents and purposes a tunnel, and while I was walking back along it this afternoon I suddenly saw a very fast flying bird heading directly towards me at head-height, it suddenly swerved to the side about ten feet in front of me and shot up through a small gap in the overhanging foliage; not sure what it would have done if there hadn’t been the gap, but it was a raptor, not a sparrow hawk though, as far as I could tell.

Merlin perhaps?

Merlin is from the West Country.

I got video of this one too before it flew away carrying it’s meal and finishing it off in a neighbours garden.

Brilliant pic – looks like it’s saying ‘Are you looking a me…?’ before it pounces…

@mariner – we’ve had one kill itself on the bedroom window. Got back off holiday to be told by the neighbour that “a kestrel had flown into the window” 🙄

What he failed to notice, apart from the wrong species, was that there was also a dead blackbird beneath the window. Obviously there’d been a chase and both had tried to use the bedroom as a short cut. There was even a feather dust imprint on the window where they’d struck!