JohnP

I can honestly say without any shadow of doubt whatsoever thay if it had been my garden these butchers and their bl**dy hounds had entered I would have ended up in court because I would have reached for my powerful .22 air rifle and started to let fly at those damn dogs. I would like to mention that the rifle is hardly ever used these days, I used to use it for target shooting and not to kill defenceless creatures, although I do confess to having shot a few troublesome Magpies that I have seen killing song birds years ago. Just thought I'd mention this as I don't want you to think I keep a gun for killing anything.

WARNING...Some of you may find this upsetting. This is the local hunt clearly breaking the law. I do hope the people who filmed it have sent a copy to the RSPCA. http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=VjuEWTapPog

Gosh... the three chicks have grown in 6 days.

Nearly 11,000 signatures on this petition, there were only just over 700 when I signed yesterday. https://submissions.epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/49422

Phil...I bet you would save a packet by using National Express.

If the weather is half decent in the morning I'm going to go to Symonds Yat near Ross-on-Wye, Peregrine Falcon nest on Yat Rock every year. I've no reason to think they won't be there this spring, it will be a binoculars/telescope viewing as it's not possible to get near enough for photographs unfortunately. I'll take my telescope just in case the RSPB guys are not there, I hope they are as they have much better telescopes than me.

I'll be very surprised if all three survive, as I said before a pecking order usually developes, I am certain one was getting more food than the other even when there were only two chicks... we will know in a couple of days.

Tina.. you beat me to it, I was just about to say the same. It's interesting that birds lay their eggs at intervals over a few days and don't starting sitting on them until they have finished laying, that way they all hatch about the same time. These three chicks have all hatched in less than 24 hours. It will be interesting to see which one becomes dominant, that usually happens with raptors, the weakest usually gets eaten by the strongest... but not always.

Tina... thank you for posting the link to the Peregrines, I have visited the site several times every day since, I will continue to do so until the chicks hopefully fledge sometime in June.

I just watched the chicks being fed on what looked like Feral Pigeon.

Update... two chicks.

I've been following these Peregrines ever since Tina posted the link, I'm not sure how many of the three eggs have hatched since yesterday but there is at least one chick this morning.

Richard... I have done comparisons on several occasions but there's never much if any saving, I don't know what vehicle you drive but I've never paid anything like what you are paying. I renewed the insurance on my Peugeot Partner Tepee in March and I paid £182.32 and that includes car hire for two weeks should my car be off the road due to an accident.

Until recently I have always stayed with my providers of everything if they offer good service and I mean everything. Same barber for over 20 years, been with O2 for my mobile since it was Cellnet and then BT Cellnet, Directline for my vehicle insurance since they started 27 years ago... the list is endless. Lately I have noticed that providers no longer care about their loyal customers and continually offer better deals to new customers, one day they will all realise that loyal customers are more important than trying to entice new customers who only stay for 12 months and then look for another new customer deal. I'm afraid I have been forced to start shopping around and stuff loyalty if it is at my expence. I now have no hesitation in telling them straight reduce the cost or I'm off.

Colin... BT seem to offer new customers better deals than their established customers... a bit like my car breakdown cover I mentioned earlier in this thread. It was only when I phoned them to cancel that they can suddenly reduce the premium by £15.00 When my BT contract is about to end I will phone BT to cancel and see what they come up with. With regard to my Orange dongle... I need that as wifi in rural Herefordshire is extremely sparse, it's OK in Hereford city but not where I live. I also like to spend time in Pembrokeshire and the same applies.

Phil... I had thought about what you suggested but 3G is not great where I live, when using my Orange dongle with my laptop I usually only get one bar on the signal meter... the odd occasion I can get 3G+ but still only one bar and the signal is prone to dropping out. Just remember I live in Herefordshire and we have only recently stopped sending smoke signals...

Thanks for all your replies... much appreciated. I'm going to take a little time and make sure I get the best deal. Money is a bit tight now my work has dried up and I'm almost retired. On another subject... I received my renewal notice for my car breakdown cover today and I was pretty annoyed that the premium had been increased by just over 25%. I got straight on the phone this morning and told them that unless they could come with a better figure they could stick it. There was lots of tapping of keys in the background and guess what... they come up with a new figure... £15.00 lower...

Thanks Dave. At the moment I pay BT £26.00 per month for unlimited broadband plus line rental. My line rental is paid until August 30th and there's not much to be saved by having the phone line with another company so I'll most likely leave that with BT. I've finished work now so I don't need unlimited broadband anymore and a limit of 10GB will be OK, I also pay Orange £10.00 per month for 2GB of mobile broadband. I can use Orange at home if I get to the 10GB limit. Here is the PlusNet package I have been looking at: http://www.plus.net/home-broadband/broadband-only/

I am considering changing my broadband supplier from BT to a cheaper alternative. Plusnet seems to do reasonably price contracts... anyone use them... are they any good?

Tina... this is what I used, I'm not saying buy it off this site, it would pay to shop around. I've had mine quite some time. http://www.digipad.co.uk/epages/es117943.sf/en_GB/?ObjectPath=/Shops/es117943_es123460326978/Products/10PKIT

Phil... this is the first clean on my 60D, I purchased the camera in Jan 2012 so I guess that's not so bad.

I'm very happy with my sensor cleaning... even though I had to do it twice. After the first clean there was just one annoying speck of dust left so I had to do a repeat clean. I went walking this morning and there was a beautiful blue sky with which to take some test shot at various apertures. I have just been scrutinising those test shots and I can't see any dust spots at all...

Welcome Grounded... looking forward to seeing your shots.

Tina... I'll come back to this after I've had a few days to give the camera a proper workout.

Brilliant...