We’re on a residential street in the middle of a city. In a wall there’s a hole in the stonework and we can see a curious eye looking at us:
It’s a male Lesser Kestrel in its nest:
Thousands of them nest communally here in Matera:
I think this one may be nervous of our presence, even though there’s constant traffic past us:
We’ve seen them here before:
It flies overhead between the buildings:
Further down into the ancient city we can see another male perched on a weather vane. This one has caught a grasshopper or cricket and has brought it back to its nest:
On top of the cockerel is one of its favourite places to perch:
They are very successful hunters:
This pair are mating on the rooftops even though he hasn’t finished his meal yet:
Then it’s time to go catch another cricket:
Falco naumanni-We’re in Matera to see the Lesser Kestrels. We’ve booked the room in the hotel which has three small terraces and the best views of them from the rooftops in the whole of the Medieval city.Magnificent, isn’t it?However, much to our anguish, this year there are none here. We can …
Yes, we’re in Matera again-We are in the oldest continuously inhabited city on Earth, Matera in Basilicata in the south of Italy. It’s possible to walk from the Palaeolithic inhabitation of the stone slopes of a rocky ravine to the heart of a modern bustling city. We’ve come to see the Lesser Kestrels, which …
2019 highlights of a wilder Italian life-My Italian life in 2019 started in January with a whale of a murmuration with a raptor on its tail. Just click to enlarge the images to see if you can find the bird of prey. I particularly love the third image, where the raptor is above a huge cone …
The Lesser Kestrels of Matera #10-When a Lesser Kestrel lands on a wire outside our bedroom window I know what I want to do. I want to get a shot of it with the out-of-focus shape of a satellite dish surrounding it: It’s a perfect symbol of the contrasts in Matera: a city continuously inhabited …
The Lesser Kestrels of Matera #9-There are Lesser Kestrels before breakfast, Lesser Kestrels on the way to breakfast, a break from Lesser Kestrels for breakfast and then Lesser Kestrels after breakfast. In Matera, there are Lesser Kestrels everywhere.
The Lesser Kestrels of Matera #8-It’s five o’clock in the morning and she’s calling immediately outside our window. I think she wants her mate. The tone is insistent and demanding. There’s a female Lesser Kestrel just outside our bedroom window in Matera. The Puffin Whisperer has definitely booked the right room. We’re surrounded by Lesser …
The Lesser Kestrels of Matera #7-We’re having close encounters of the wildlife kind: There are Lesser Kestrels all over Matera. I’m sure the locals must become immune to their charms, but I just can’t imagine that happening to me. Who could resist looking skywards and seeing an elegant flypast? They are now settling into pairs …
The Lesser Kestrels of Matera #6-Matera. Just look at it. Isn’t it magnificent? What a city! The ancient heart of the stone city of Matera is where we’re heading. It’s taken hours of driving, or in my case, hours of passengering, to get here. We have two nights in a room with a terrace and …
The Lesser Kestrels of Matera #5-We’ve just been on a brief trip to one of my favourite places. It’s Matera, in the south of Italy. It’s the world’s oldest continuously inhabited city, with 12,000 year old Stone-Age remains on the cliffs below a Medieval city below a modern city. One the rooftops nest 6,000 Lesser …