Saw a small flock of lapwings today. I’ve not seen many peewit recently. I use to see lots when I was young. Other things that seem to be less common: brown hares, house sparrows large flocks of starlings and even rabbits. I see a lot more foxes and roe deer now.
@johnjohnston Wildlife has changed here too. I too have not seen a large flock of starlings in a long time. Many more coyotes, fewer rabbits (probably due to coyotes). Lots more white tail deer. More red tail hawks. Plus all sorts of new invasive insects.
@bradenslen on my part some of it might be age related nostalgia but some I am sure is due to major changes mostly for the worse.
@johnjohnston A lot of what I see is nature rebalancing itself, healing, from the ravages of Man so it’s for the better. When I was young almost all the predators had been wiped out in this area. Deer were still around but over hunted. Birds of prey were endangered due to the ravages of DDT. Today all of these are back with a vengence.
As an example, when I was young in the summer you could put the cat out for the night. I lived in an place surrounded by woodlands and for the most part the cat was in quite overjoyed to be prowling around at night. Doing that today, where I live would be a death sentence for the cat because of the coyotes which are now all around us. Coyotes were declared almost extinct here in the early 1970’s, all bounties were lifted, peoples attitudes changed, and now they have come back in a big way. The rabbits are not so thrilled though.
@bradenslen
I like that. A good thought on the last day of the year. 🙏