High-fliers. An ancient volcano. The macarena. The search for a bite-sized bird of prey in Edinburgh’s green spaces.
There are many advantages to living in the city – good public transport, museums, restaurants, sporting events, live music, the ratio of Greggs-to-person per square mile, but an often-overlooked benefit of urban landscapes is its access to wildlife. Most “city slickers” would tell you they aren’t regularly crossing paths with animals, besides the neighbour’s dog, or the mice rummaging through their cupboards. But if you were to ask an intercity dwelling birder, they might tell you a completely different story. They would describe a world full of wildlife. They would say, you only need to know where to look.
Having the good fortune to live in a beautiful place like Edinburgh, where there is an abundance of green space, I set out one rare sunny afternoon to the crown jewel of all green spaces, Holyrood Park. There, located in heart of the city, on top of the ancient volcano, I hoped to find another type of “city slicker,” the bite-sized bird of prey, the common kestrel.
The Crags – Holyrood Park
To catch a glimpse of this kestrel I would need to equip myself with some reliable kit. For this walk in the park I chose the aptly named Viking Kestrel 8×25. This compact binocular affords me ease of use with its small size that I can fold up and fit it into a coat pocket. And if you’re like me and choose to wear it around your neck, you’re likely to quickly forget it’s there. As was the case when I came close to the summit of Arthur’s Seat in Holyrood Park and spotted the kestrel. There it was, hovering eerily still a few metres above the ground. And there I was, standing completely still, violently rummaging through my coat pockets looking like I was doing some version of the macarena. Where was the binocular? Oh no, I thought, I forgot it.
If this happens to you, and a few seconds later you snap back to reality and remember they are hanging around your neck, you will quickly learn that the best part about the Kestrel binocular is not only the lightness, but the optics inside. Long gone are the days of Porro Prisms and the direct correlation between size and brightness. These days you don’t need a massive objective lens to give your binocular robust light gathering power. This is especially true for the Viking Kestrel 8×25, which has specially coated extra low dispersion glass (ED), allowing for truer colors, less chromatic aberration, and an overall brighter image. The binocular not only performs exceptionally well for its size, and price, but it also thrives in low light conditions like dusk, dawn, and stormy weather—as is usually the case in Scotland and Great Britain.
Observing the kestrel through my binocular, I felt as if my brain was malfunctioning—how could something be so perfectly still in the sky? Then I noticed its little head turning left and right. It was scanning the hillside for its prey. Then it dropped to a lower height, caught itself, and resumed its hovering. It was in this moment that I was grateful for the kit that I brought.
©Photograph: Alex Cooper Photography
The magnification was perfect (8x as opposed to the 10x option). It framed the kestrel close enough to see, but not too close so that it was hard to distinguish what exactly I was looking at, and helped to avoid any distracting shaking. The ED glass, which helped give definition to the edges around the bird, provided a clear contrast between the kestrel’s grey head and the grey sky behind it. The lightness and ease of use meant I wasn’t concerned about my arms getting tired. And the overall sharpness of the image through the binoculars meant I was able to see clearly—even in low light conditions—the grey head, the chestnut-brown body, the slate-blue wings, and a rusty-red tail with a black stripe. I therefore was able to identify this kestrel as a male.
But after a few minutes following the bird, diving, hovering, diving again, my encounter came to an end. The kestrel finally spotted his prey and plunged off the hillside. So I continued my hike to the summit, and couldn’t help but reflect on the maybe not-so-subtle connection between the bird and my binocular that shared the same name. They’re both compact—that much is obvious—but they both also pack a punch. They’re both durable, tough, able to deal with inclement weather of all kinds. They’re both super adaptable, useful in a number of environments, rural or urban, strenuous or not so strenuous. And most importantly, I came to realize, as the kestrel came into view once more, a small vole in its mouth, that they both get the job done.
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