After the best part of a week of gloom, dense low cloud, on Sunday afternoon the weather brightened up. An evening walk was in order. I ponder why I'm here with my camera; to witness and to record. These fields and wetlands will within the next decade be wall-to-wall housing; before then, I want to show Jeziorki as it was back in the early 21st century. Above: wheat.
Above: Potatoes. A typically Mazovian field, narrow and long. My walk took me to the end of the road, up ul. Kórnicka to the railway line, in time to catch the 19:03 W-wa Wschodnia to Kielce (Corpus Christi holidays only) service as it trundled southwards. Below: looking down the line from the pedestrian level crossing at ul. Kórnicka towards W-wa Jeziorki.
I doubled back along ul. Kórnicka and on to ul. Dumki, to take in the wetlands that lay between this road and ul. Trombity. Here, as the shadows lengthened, I caught this bird of prey (below) swooping down over the reedbeds. (It's a long way off, but can anyone tell what it is?)
Following ul. Dumki home, I had a feeling of deja vu - childhood holidays in northern France in the late 1960s, the chemins vicinals between Stella-Plage, Trepied and Cucq. Same atmosphere in the air, same scents and sights. The bad news is the mosquitos are out in force big time, especially over the reedbeds. The good news is that the padlocked gate closing off the public footpath between ul. Dumki and ul. Sarabandy has been re-opened.
This time last year:
Darkness and light in the city's centre
As always, great photos, and a very interesting blog! I wonder if the bird could be a red kite (Milvus milvus), that was my first idea because of the colouring). Hard to say, though!
ReplyDeleteRed Kite aka kania ruda, Polish Wikipedia says it 'nearly exclusively' is found in western Polish provinces; there are only 600-700 pairs in the whole country. If this is a Red Kite - WOW!
ReplyDeleteI think, though, looking at the pic enlarged, that the wing undersurfaces/trailing edges are too white... More research is falled for. Thanks for the suggestion!
You're welcome - hope you can find out what bird it is! I like red kites, we have some over here as well. They love catching fish in the abandoned fishpond in the next village, it must be like the Land of Plenty for them!
ReplyDeleteGood luck with your research, and keep us posted if you find out! ;-)
More than likely, a Marsh Harrier, błotnik stawowy.
ReplyDelete