Four years ago, to the day, we put this April Fool image up on our DOP Facebook page:
Two Ospreys, a Flounder, a Kite and No Fools
Blue 24 Defends Her Catch from Blue 5F and a Red Kite Joins In
Surely no one would believe that a pair of 10-foot curlews would have colonised an osprey nest. Would they?
It's a great feeling playing a practical joke on someone, it's even better playing it on thousands of people. But the curlew joke of 1st April 2012 would backfire - big time. You see, a couple of hours later a red kite landed on the boingy perch as Nora got on with her nestorations while waiting for Monty to return. So we put the image up, straight after the 10-foot curlews:
Nora and Red Kite. © MWT
Of course, nobody would believe that a red kite and an osprey would choose to be so close and tolerant of each other on 1st April. But they were and they did!
And so we've had our little jokes each year on this very day, a touch of Photoshop just to liven things up a bit and see who isn't still half-asleep. Fast forward four years to this year, and we have a red kite again. No, really, a red kite.
As Blue 24 was preparing for another season of finding a bachelor male, a cousin of hers from Rutland, Blue 5F, decided to engage her in battle. It actually got quite vicious, but the curious thing was, this red kite wanted to join in!
Double Bluff
This morning's Facebook image was a double bluff.
Blue 24 (on nest) and Red Kite. © MWT
The kite was actually there, but who would believe it? No photoshop, no creative airbrushing, the kite seemed to join in with Blue 5F as she dive-bombed poor old Blue 24.
Here is the footage to prove it. It's taken with our very newest camera (more on this in a later blog) with no fancy edits or trickery-pokery. Just one camera and in amazing resolution.
It's one of the most remarkable scenes we've ever recorded at the Dyfi, a real treat for the animal behaviourists too. Notice how Blue 24 hardly takes any notice of another bird of prey species that's the same size as her (just as Nora didn't in 2012). She is only concerned about the unwanted attention from Blue 5F.
So no tomfoolery this year, just an incredible piece of filming that is hard to believe happened on any given day, let alone today!
Hit Full Screen and HD - you won't want to miss anything here. Amazing footage - two ospreys, a flounder, a kite and not a fool in sight...