Kestrel Hide
Our Kestrel hide was set up after these birds successfully breed in one of our purpose-built nest boxes. They are monitored all year round, please see our Facebook page for updates.
Hide Rental: (Usually June-Sept) £120 per person per day. Two or Three persons (three maximum) booking together, £90 each per day.
Lens Range: 400-600mm (Full Frame or Crop Sensor Photo or Video)
Hide Location. Harlthorpe (30 mins S/E of York). 2 Min walk from our Car Park.
The hides are open at 8 am prompt and close at 5 pm, although you are welcome to stay later with agreement. They consist of two pop-up and one permanent all with plenty of space, on sunny windless days the hides can get hot, please bring plenty of water.
There are no sit-down toilets on site.
Advice and Hide Rules.
Green Farm is a working farm, occasionally you might experience tractors visiting the fields and noise from the main yard, but this doesn't affect the birds.
Movement. To improve visits refrain from fast camera movement between perches, do not move any perches!
For the best experience please put your mobile phone on silent, make as little noise as possible, and do not tap the hide to attract the birds to look at you.
The birds can arrive anytime between 8 am-5 pm, on average in the first few hours, sometimes ten minutes after being fed, They are wild birds so the actual time they visit is out of our control.
The hides were originally set up to be at least 2 meters apart so some perches are shot from different angles, What works well in one hide might not in the other two, and vice versa, we set up food on all perches to get good shots.
The Kestrels are not dependent on our food, the male does all the hunting until the chicks can control their body temperature so the female will brood them for a few weeks, the male also helps occasionally with incubation and feeding, after this time the female will leave the nest but only venture close by to protect the young.
Before they leave the box, in the first few days one mouse will be sufficient to feed all five young, as the days progress the number builds up before they leave the box they will need 2-3 each, and once branched 3-5 each, this year 2021 the family is 7 strong so at the peak they'll need 35 mice a day, 245 a week 980 before the parents stop feeding them.
Once the young have left the nest they will be building up their strength by branching into the nearest trees, preening and observing their new surroundings, for the first few weeks the adults will still feed them. At approx. week two of branching the adults will start to train the young.
The sun rises at approx. 4.30 am, as do the birds, the Adult male will be off hunting, and both will start calling them off their perches to start training.
To attract the birds in front of the hide is a balance with not overfeeding them, but also bringing them to the perches at a distance they are comfortable with and that doesn't stress them out, remember they are wild birds and that's how we want them to remain.
