outdoors shite: your favourite animal spots

[Sneezeblossom]

What's been your favourite animal spot whilst out?
I love it when I get a rare glimpse of hare boxing, a barn owl or a doe with her fawn.

Nothing too exotic but was out in the Broads this morning and saw great crested grebes doing their courtship dance which was lovely :)

Once nearly ran over a red squirrel in the Lake District...

I saw a crane flying over the broadside, massive bird!

Golden eagle somewhere in the Inner Hebrides. It would be reasonably interesting in the sky, but what really made it for me was the fact that it was at ground level and incredibly close. I was walking along a particularly craggy cliff edge and something the size of a large dog sort of stumbled/lurched out about a metre in front of me, then took off and soared. The size of it! Amazing.

I'm fairly fond of sheep and I always get ridiculously excited when I see deer and red squirrels.

We had a peregrine nest locally last year which was wonderful to watch. Drew quite a crowd though.

Marsh harriers are the local raptor of choice usually.

Kingfishers along the canal are always lovely.

I'd love to see a kingfisher

Puffins on treshnish isles. Absolutely brilliant. They sit there in front of you.

Also saw golden eagle on Ulva/Mull - we weren't even trying to see it but it circled round fairly low.

Locally I see red kites and buzzards a lot. A bit of a distraction when driving

I saw a European Eagle Owl! In north Oxfordshire

Ok. I'm sorry but wtf is this topic world cup 2010?

I'm in Australia at the moment, so far our wildlife spots are as follows

2 very large Huntsman spiders bigger than the ones in the pic. One in our bathroom had gazillions of babies. Bleee.

a pair of Wedge tailed eagles

Kangaroos x3

Rather proud of seeing an echidna in the wild

more cane toads than you can kill with dettol shake a stick at, probably upwards of 200 this year.

snakes x3 - carpet python, red bellied black (scary) and unidentified small one.

paralysis ticks I've had one, dd has had one and both the dogs have had one (Jack needed antivenom). Conclusion? ticks don't like my dh or ds.

I'm so looking forward to coming home and seeing fluffy bunnies and ducks!

echidna fail

its a sit in, occupying a derelict topic to get a new outdoors topic!

Yes to kingfisher, they're so tiny and gorgeous.

Things I've never seen but want to include a red squirrel, at risk of sounding thick are there any left and where could I spot one?

Quite ordinary but I still get a little excited when I see a rabbit out in the wild.

I ran over a squirrel in Oxford - does that count?

Suggest you also occupy swine flu btw.

Fair enough

I hear the weather is beautifully spring like at the mo'. Are the primroses out yet? not jealous at all you understand except that we've had rain for all but 5 days this year

The Lake District and the Isle of Wight both famously have red squirrels rather than the beastly greys.

The lune valley nr lake district (howgills area and ravenstonedale) good place to see red squirrels. Saw one in ravenstonedale village.

Swine flu could come back ;-)

Nothing too exotic but was out in the Broads this morning and saw great crested grebes doing their courtship dance which was lovely

we had a boat on the broads may hols a couple of years ago - absolutely brilliant for birds. Loads of grebes with their little humbugs. More herons than DD could keep count of. Kingfishers. Being accidentally woken at 4am (we were meant to wake at 6 to get to Potter at right time for bridge, mobile set to wrong timezone!) - but hearing symphony of cuckoo and bitterns booming.
Lots of Marsh Harriers. And - unexpected but memorable - being moored up in a quiet spot, a pair of black swans did their courtship dance right in front of us. They mirror each others moves, fascinating... culminating in doing the deed . Ver' educational!

Can't recommend a boat on the broads in may too highly!

We used to be able to see red squirrels reliably at Formby, but they got badly affected by squirrelpox. I think they're starting to make a comeback, but haven't seen one myself for a while there. (we had one run in front of the car in the Lakes earlier this year)

I saw a charm of goldfinches in my very urban village this morning.

Leighton Moss RSPB is good. We've seen bittern there a few times; lots of the 'normal' waders and wildfowl, bearded tits, plus egrets (once, a Great White!!) and avocet. Living in the Northwest we're a bit spoilt - lapwing are commonplace but they are so wonderful.