Anyone lost a peacock?

Peacock’s aren’t (normally) regarded as a species of bird indigenous to these shores. OK, maybe not until now…. There’s been a young male peacock on the loose in the Tin Pit and Coldharbour area of Marlborough for the past few weeks squawking, nibbling runner beans , lettuces and other veg and saying to those who see him ‘look at me’. Bit young yet to have developed the ‘eye’ tail feathers but as the pic shows, the beautiful colours and size are already there.

He’s been around this area of Marlborough now for a while. Where is he from? Has anyone with peacocks in their garden lost a young one? Just let us know – info@marlborough.news. He is still young as noted above. Probably about one year old, maybe a bit less as the tail feathers haven’t yet started to grow and develop the ‘eye’ patterns. So maybe he is fairly local, although peacocks can (and do) fly distances. But age would likely indicate that he hasn’t flown that far. But he’s enjoying where he is.

One Tin Pit resident, Eric, describes what the peacock does in his garden, but he’s enjoying plenty of other neighbouring gardens as well. This area of Marlborough sounds a bit like ‘peacock heaven’.

“In the past mornings the peacock has found a small area of soft, dusty soil between my two runner bean wigwams. It works itself into a depression in the soil because birds get dust on their feathers in the mornings primarily as part of dust bathing, a behaviour that helps them maintain their plumage and remove excess oil and debris. When finished it helps itself to a snack of my runner bean leaves, which I observed, with evidence left on the ground, it then fluffs up its feathers and runs berserk in circles around the garden before taking off. Early one morning it decided on a different menu thus was seen standing in a small area set aside for lettuce ripping off parts of several leaves, the plants were then unusable for a week or more.“

“He maybe lovely but we could do without the 5:30 am wake call in the morning” noted resident Hazel, in who’s garden the peacock has also found solace (along with all sorts of juicy vegetables and plants).

Below is a quick video of the peacock on a roof in Tin Pit, early one morning:

At this age he’s probably looking for female company – so are there any young peahens in the Tin Pit area of Marlborough? If not, he’ll probably go elsewhere to find one. But any information rearding where he may have come from, let us know.