somewhere on the sea

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[new 2 pfowl]

Your property looks so spectacular, wild and wonderful.
And your peas seem very curious, healthy, and content.
Its so lovely to see all of these pictures! I hope you post more.

 

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As much as I'd like to say disco mirror balls are just for fun weirdness -I find them- really any moving mirror- one of the best deterrents against raptor/owl strike.
I've got a flock of tiny Rapa Nui and four have been taken by Sharp-Shinned hawks since the summer. They take them in the thorn scrub but never at the cote door as they had done before its purchase and placement.
Martha's Vineyard is a wintering ground and nesting territory for many species of birds of prey.

Nevertheless, a whole class of terrestrial predators are absent- no foxes, coyotes, wolves, mountain lions, lynx, bobcat, golden eagles, bears or pine martens.


This means your peahens and peakeats don't just up and vanish like they are apt to on the mainland.
In Telluride and Vermont we have all the above + a few others.

As this home is directly on the water we do have otters and that can be surprisingly tricky at times- especially as it relates to nests.

This year has been very strange for the sight of up to four snowy owls right here on the property- out on the bluffs and there have been many more sighted on even the populated parts of the island. Evidently there is an unprecedented mass migration of the species.
I think one may have killed a large marans rooster down at the farm. They are taking plenty of skunks and raccoons as well feral cats no doubt.

Raccoons were introduced a decade ago or so - for what reason -no one can tell you- and everyone knows what sort of damage those monkey bears can do but as they have no competition from other animals for food, they don't seem to be as destructive as they are in Vermont. There are also skunks on Martha's Vineyard but again, there is so much food washed up on the beaches- and under all those fallow orchards, all the acorns- blueberries and rosehips -plus all the rodents you could shake a whisker at- skunks seem pretty content without destroying poultry and eggs.

We've always had white emerald peafowl over at the family house on Nantucket but this unit represents a new closed gene pool founder flock with just the one white emerald male.

The free ranging flock of red buff peafowl at Griffin Hill in Colorado are not a reality yet. Facilities are nowhere near completed and we're still waiting for the numbers needed. We need close to fifty females to meet that initiative and ten or so juvenile males that meet certain strict criteria. All the same, judging from replies I take it that none of the breeders are rearing this subbreed any longer. The barns will be completed by fall of 2012. If there are no Red Buffs in the numbers I'm needing I'll table that idea for another year. They need to be ruddy and tiger striped not the frosty and emerald of the birds here on the cape.


Every time I see this painting I am reminded to give thanks to the house that Tut built.

 

[new 2 pfowl]

Aha, that's the disco ball story. Makes sense
Along the same lines, we've taken a tip from our time in Japan and have CD's hanging in front of our windows to prevent bird strikes.
In Japan they use dangling CDs as crow deterrents in both urban and rural settings.
Probably much cheaper than a disco ball (but of course much less decorative! and definitely not a conversation starter!).

Thank you again for the wonderful pictures.

 

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I can't seem to capture the iridescence on Ashoka the white emerald.

 

[MinxFox]

White peafowl can be really hard to photograph because of the glare.