We had a surprise visitor in the garden this afternoon.
I was watching the birds on the food that we had put out, when a couple of blackbirds landed on the fence. One chased the other off as expected and I thought nothing of it. A few seconds later, one flew across the garden sounding its alarm call and I thought that there was a cat in the garden, then everything else started flying off in alarm. Seconds later at high speed a bird came flying in towards the Christmas tree and slowed at the last moment, but missed the small bird in the tree. It landed, turned round and flew off. At this point, I realised it was a kestral, the first time I have ever seen one in town before. Needless to say the garden was rather quiet for a few hours afterwards.