A blog to share barn owl and other wildlife and general news about the Retreat and its environment.
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Kestrel swoops on stock dove, twice in a few seconds
11. July 2022, Wildlife
In 2022 stock doves took over our barn owl nest box, displacing our barn owls who were visiting the box but had not taken up residence for breeding.
A kestrel noticed the doves coming and going. One one video (three days after this one) we filmed a kestrel taking up position ready to swoop on the dove, and the dove diving under the box instead of entering it.
This video shows a female kestrel swooping down, claws out, trying to grab the dove, but the dove took sharp evasive action. The kestrel looped around and made another swoop four seconds later.
Six days later we found a wing of a dove, on the ground about ten feet from the nest box, surrounded by lots of feathers. It seems that the kestrel was persistent and succeeded. There had been two dove eggs in the box, one of which had just hatched, but the hatchling had died by the time we discovered the situation.
READ MORE: Kestrel swoops on stock dove, twice in a few seconds
Barn owls try to recover their nestbox from stock doves
27. June 2022, Wildlife
In 2022 our barn owl nest box was taken over by a pair of stock doves when the owls didn't visit the box for a few days. One smallish barn owl had been roosting there during daytimes pretty regularly, and wanted to continue doing so. By now the stock doves had two eggs.
One dove was sitting on the eggs when suddenly a large barn owl crashed into the box, seemingly summoned by the smaller owl, and smothered the dove briefly. Yet the barn owl did not seem to aim to harm the dove, and then flew away.
The doves did not succeed in raising their young - see video 'kestrel swoops on stock dove'. Neither did the owls breed here that year though they did in 2023.
READ MORE: Barn owls try to recover their nestbox from stock doves
