Another windy day, and there was a kingfisher perched in a sheltered spot
just upstream of the weir. She was right at the edge of a dense mass of ivy which grows over a small tree extending over the water. I watched her for several minutes before she made a short dive into the ivy and stayed hidden. On my way back I heard two kingfishers calling at the same place before they suddenly flew out and disappeared upriver.
It’s possible this will be a nesting site. There is plenty of cover for them, but hardly any bank to dig a nest hole, and I would have thought there was a danger of flooding at any time of year. Mink are known to dig down into nests so it doesn’t seem an ideal spot. The path is close by too, but I watched a nest hole in a river bank at Wolvercote near Oxford as a bird came and went while children and dogs splashed about in the shallows directly beneath.
If there is a nest it won’t be visible, and the only proof will be seeing birds fly into the ivy with fish in their beaks. This stretch is regularly used by parents teaching fledglings to fish but I’ve concluded that the actual nests are elsewhere. It will be interesting to see how things develop over the next couple of months.
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