Monday 18 March 2024

Avoiding A Soaking

Saturday morning, I headed to the coastal farm fields at Rossall, hoping for a bit of migration action, and there was some, not a huge amount, but it was migration. I headed out from my car under five oktas cloud cover, with a 10 - 15 mph south-easterly wind, and it was a tad cold. 

From the off, Meadow Pipits were heading north, and I had 63 in total. Other visible migrants included a Chaffinch, four Alba Wags, six Magpies, 12 Woodpigeons, six Jackdaws, 22 Pink-footed Geese, four Linnets, a Dunnock, a Goldfinch, three Skylarks, two Collared Doves, 5+ Siskins (stratospheric calling birds), and four Starlings. Not a bad selection of species 'on vis', even if the numbers were somewhat low. 
 
Meadow Pipit
 
The sea was quiet with 11 Eiders, two Cormorants, two Shelducks and a single Red-throated Diver still in winter plumage. The only grounded migrants that I had, other than about ten Meadow Pipits, were two males and a female Stonechat
 
Stonechat
 
As I walked along the track to the south, with adjacent mature hedge and rather full ditch, I heard a splashing sound behind me. I turned round expecting to see a Mallard, or Moorhen, but was confronted with a pale, long-winged bird, using its wings to pull itself through the water. Even though it was only a split-second, time seemed to stand still, and at first, I couldn't compute what the bird was, because it was completely out of context. It was a soggy Barn Owl
 
My rucksack, tripod, bins, camera, and coat were off in a jiffy, and I was going to enter the ditch to pull the Barn Owl out. However, I think because I came along, it gave it the impetus to try and move along the ditch, and just as I was about to slide into the water, it managed to grab hold of some low hanging Hawthorn branches and pull itself out. It climbed along the tangle of Hawthorn branches, struggling to make much headway, but then did a short flight to the other side of the bank, and out into the sunshine. I walked back along the track, and round the end of the hedge, but the Barn Owl had gone, so it had obviously managed to fly away. A good deed done, and on the plus side, I managed to avoid a soaking!
 
Why the Barn Owl was in the water I'm not entirely sure. Barn Owls sometimes drown in cattle drinking troughs, and it is thought that they are attacking their own reflection, thinking it is another Barn Owl in their territory. The ditch was covered in Duckweed, so this bird would not have been able to see its reflection, and after a chat with Will, he wondered whether it had gone after an amphibian, and I think he is probably right. A Frog could well have been moving through the Duckweed, and the choked, green surface of the water will have looked solid to the poor Barn Owl.
 
On my way home I called in at the Nature Park, to see if there were any Sand Martins and Wheatears, and there wasn't. Skylarks and Cetti's Warblers were singing, and on the pools were 22 Coots, three Little Grebes (two singing), 18 Tufted Ducks, a pair of Great Crested Grebes and a male Shoveler.  
 
Tufted Duck(s) above & below
 


Yesterday afternoon Gail and I had a walk along the Wyre estuary from the Quay. We had 6 oktas cloud cover, with a light south-easterly wind. It was very warm on our outward leg, but cooler on our return leg.

The tide was starting to run in, and 185 Redshanks were roosting on some of the higher sections of mud. We had 35 Oystercatchers flying upstream to their roost, and at their roost site on Arm Hill, we counted at least 400 roosting. There was still plenty of mud at Great Knott, but only 81 Oystercatchers on there. 

A Small Tortoiseshell butterfly on the wing, and that was it. We've got our last wintering bird survey to do tomorrow, and the forecast isn't great. We are going to do it tomorrow anyway, because the forecast for the remainder of the week, and into next week isn't any better. Fingers crossed they get it wrong!

Thursday 14 March 2024

Boxes Again

I suppose this wouldn't be a natural history blog, if I didn't complain about the weather from time to time, and just as sites were starting to dry out, it's raining again! There we go, complaint over...for now! 

Mondays are a bit tied up for Gail and I, because we look after our grandson Alex, but on the Monday just gone, the weather actually dried up in the afternoon, and even the sun attempted to make an appearance. We bundled him into his car seat, threw the pram in the boot, and headed up to Larkholme. The plan was to have a wander along the sea-front with Alex in his pram, stretch our legs at the same time. My bins and notebook are always with me, and I did wonder whether an early Wheatear might make an appearance. It didn't.
 
The tide was just turning, and the sea was flat calm, perfect conditions for a cetacean or two perhaps, but that wasn't to be either. I only had my bins with me, so I was very limited as to what I could see and identify without my scope. At least 24 Eiders were drifting slowly on the mill pond, and then I picked up a small duck (small in comparison to the Eiders) heading north. Luckily for me, as it headed north it was coming closer to shore, and I could see that it was a male Scaup. Not what I was expecting when we decided to take Alex for a walk!
 
A Grey Wagtail and a few Meadow Pipits were feeding in the wet grassland, and eight Turnstones were on the stone armour along the shore. 
 
It had been five days since we called at the Nature Park to check the water levels, and as it was quite sunny again on Tuesday afternoon, Gail and I decided to have a look on the pools to see if there were any early Sand Martins about. There wasn't. The water level in our ringing area had dropped, from five days ago, but it was still too flooded to get into the Willow scrub. 
 
Again, the tide was on the turn, and there have been some big tides over the last few days, in the region of 10.6 metres, and these completely cover the saltmarsh. Gail spotted a Skylark on the edge of the saltmarsh feeding on seeds from some of the saltmarsh plants, and I managed to get a few photographs of it. We were enjoying watching it, until a dog walker asked us what we were looking at, and his dog flushed it. When we told him we were looking at birds, he said his dog chased birds!  

 Skylark (above & below)



Anyway, there were at least two Skylarks singing, and a further five birds feeding on some short-cropped grass. We had a look through the Gulls on the pools, and counted 80 Herring Gulls, 14 Lesser Black-backed Gulls, four Great Black-backed Gulls and five Black-headed Gulls. No spring white wingers. 
 
Other counts from the pools included 25 Coot, the continually photographed pair of Great Crested Grebes that the 'Toggers' can't leave alone (how many full-framed shots of a Great Crest do you need?), 12 Mallards, five Tufted Ducks and five Little Grebes
 
Great Crested Grebe
 
At least two Cetti's Warblers were singing, and also on the passerine front we had a fly-over Rock Pipit (pushed off the saltmarsh), three Reed Buntings and a pair of Stonechats. On the river were seven Wigeon, and a group of Black-tailed Godwits and Knots were heading back downstream as the tide fell. 
 
Yesterday, Gail and I headed to our friend's farm where we have 30 nest boxes up for Tree Sparrows. They are not all used by Tree Sparrows of course, with the boxes closer to the yard being favoured by them. We checked all the boxes, and they were in fine fettle, and we only had to replace two. 
 
We had a look on the wetland, and we had c.200 Teal and a Little Egret. A Chiffchaff was singing from the woodland where we have some of our boxes, and a pair of Buzzards were displaying. 
 
It's looking wet again tomorrow, but there's a chance that it will be fit to get out Saturday morning. That's the issue at the moment, it just seems to be an hour here, or a couple of hours there, when it's fit enough to get out.

Saturday 9 March 2024

Birds, Bikers and Boxes

On the last day of February, this year a date that only comes around every four years, I had a solo outing along the Quay and Wyre estuary. It was a cold morning, with full cloud cover, and a brisk south-westerly wind, and an in-coming tide. 
 
The Redshanks were being pushed to the drier areas of the Quay, and totalled 251, which is quite a good count for the site. Oystercatchers had already cleared out, and all that were left, were just five birds. The tide had nearly covered Great Knott, and as a consequence, only about 200 birds were on here. Oycs could be seen flying upstream, and were heading to a roost site on the other side of the river. 
 
Just two Teal were in the Quay, and 62 Wigeon were in the channel, and other than a bedraggled looking female Peregrine, that was it.
 
When I first got to the Quay, I had to wait in my car for a heavy shower to pass over, and this is when Gail phoned me with some sad news. 
 
I don't do celebrity. I respect talented musicians, or academics, and I have my conservation heroes, like Ian Newton, and the late, great Derek Ratcliffe, but that's about it, apart from two guys who ride motorbikes, and cook food that looks like you would eat it, rather than some of the so-called celebrity chef's offerings. Stuffed pea, with a berry jus anyone?
 
Gail phoned me to say that Hairy Biker, Dave Myers, had sadly passed away after a two-year battle with cancer. We have been watching their latest series, The Hairy Bikers Go West, and although Dave did look poorly at times, we honestly thought that he was on the mend, so it came as a real shock.
 
I had the pleasure of meeting the Hairy Bikers a number of years ago now, when Gail and I went to see them at a sold-out performance at Blackpool's Winter Gardens. Gail is a real fan of the Hairy's, and we had managed to secure seats on the second row, on the edge of the central isle in the stalls. During the interval, I noticed an 'official' photographer knelt on the stage taking pictures of the audience, and the camera was pointing at yours truly more often than not.
 
I have a resemblance to Dave, and if I had £5 for every time I have been asked "are you Dave Myers", I could retire. We have been in remote places, like castle Eilean Donan, in Highland for example, having coffee and cake, and a member of staff has come up to me and asked if I was Dave from the Hairy Bikers!
 
When the Bikers came back on stage after the interval, Si King came to the front of the stage and said "we need a volunteer to help with this next bit, and that will be you sir", pointing at me at the same time. I climbed up on stage with Si exclaiming to Dave that I must be his long, lost brother, and Dave ran across the stage shouting "brother", and gave me an enormous hug. I spent the next ten minutes on stage with them, helping with a daft Houdini act, where Dave was in padlock and chains, and it was my job to check everything was secure. Of course, they were setting me up, because every time I said that a padlock and chain was secure, it would come undone. Gail thought it was hilarious, and after getting over my initial surprise, I did enjoy it. 
 
Dave was a lovely bloke, and he is gone far too soon. Rest in peace fella.
 
A couple of mentions of some garden wildlife over this past week or so. We now have Frog spawn in our pond, and up to press, there are over six Frogs every night in the pond, so hopefully we might get a little more. 
 
Frog spawn
 
We also had an avian terminator in the garden one afternoon, in the form of a male Sparrowhawk. I looked out of the window and thought the garden looked quiet, and there perched up in the apple tree was this little fellow below!
 
Sparrowhawk
 
On the first day of the month, Gail and I visited our Pied Flycatcher nest box scheme in the Hodder Valley in Bowland. We have 43 boxes up, and we replaced two that were looking a bit tired, and put another two up, making 45 boxes in total now. 
 
Our 45th box on site
 
The sound-scape as we walked amongst the trees, was that of displaying Curlew from the fields at the top of the valley sides. In the bottom of the valley, a female Goosander flew upstream, and we also had two Jays, a Great Spotted Woodpecker, two Siskins, a singing Goldcrest and two Brown Hares
 
A few plants were starting to show, with flowers appearing on the Dog's Mercury and Lords-and-Ladies were more obvious on the still relatively bare woodland floor in places. Splashes of colour were provided by Scarlet Elfcup, and this colourful fungus was scattered throughout the woodland.  

Lords-and-Ladies
 
Scarlet Elfcup
 

A few days ago, I had a meeting at my client's farm near Slaidburn, again in Bowland. I got there early, and had a drive round in my car to see what I could see. There is a good network of tracks on the farm, and you can drive round using your car as a mobile hide. 
 
Curlews and Lapwings had started to arrive back on the farm, and I had four and six of each, a lot more to arrive yet. Oystercatchers were in greater numbers, 26 were alongside the main pool in the central wetland complex. As was a Little Egret, which is regular now, and I must admit it still looks odd in this upland landscape. Two species of raptor, and an honorary raptor; two Buzzards, a Kestrel and a Raven. A male Stonechat, also made it into my notebook. Always a good species to see. 
 
Part of the main pool at my client's farm
 
Oystercatcher
 

The following day I was at my wintering bird survey site, south of the Ribble, for the penultimate visit. It was quite a crisp, clear morning with a sharp easterly breeze. I added a new species for the site, for the survey period, in the form of a Great White Egret, and had seven of their 'Little' cousins. 
 
Woodpigeon  numbers were still relatively high, with a total of 103, and a group of 18 Fieldfares had tagged onto a feeding flock of Starlings. A number of Starling flocks, 1,900 birds in total, were arriving from the northwest and heading south at first light, and I'm guessing that they were coming from the large roost under one of the piers at Blackpool.  
 
Woodpigeon
 
Fourteen Skylarks, included four singing individuals, and Shelducks had increased to ten. Tree Sparrow numbers had also increased, and I had nine, very vocal birds as I walked my transect. Linnets numbered 77, and other bits and pieces included a Sparrowhawk, two Kestrels, a male Stonechat and a Buzzard.  
 
Gail and I were back at the Quay a few days ago, and it was a gloriously sunny, but cold morning. Wader numbers were down as it was low tide, and we just had 30 Redshanks and nine Oystercatchers. We noticed that Common Whitlowgrass was flowering, and it won't be long before lots of other plants start flowering as well. 
 
Towards the end of the week, we paid at visit to the Nature Park to oil the padlocks on the gates that give us access to the site, check the water levels in our ringing area, and carry out some management work if possible. We managed to complete two out of the three tasks that we set ourselves. 
 
The padlocks were all oiled, and the last padlock on the gate into our ringing area needed a bit of persuading to unlock, but it is now well and truly oiled, and ready for the spring. The water levels were very high, as expected, and we couldn't even get our car to where we normally park, let alone walk into our net rides. We will keep checking on a weekly basis, until the water levels have dropped enough for us to get in, but it could take a few weeks. We tried to coppice a few Willows in a less flooded area, but the bow waves of walking through the water was spilling over the top of our wellies, so we just coppiced one large Willow and called it a day. 
 
Close to where we coppiced the large Willow we flushed five Snipe, and around the pools over the rest of the site we recorded four singing Cetti's Warblers, 24 Coots, five Little Grebes (two singing), 14 Tufted Ducks, 130 Herring Gulls, two Great Black-backed Gulls, a pair of Great Crested Grebes, a pair of Mute Swans, 19 Mallards, nine Black-headed Gulls, two Lesser Black-backed Gulls, six Canada Geese and ten Wigeon on the river.
 
Great Crested Grebe
 
Lesser Black-backed Gull
 
Little Grebe

A pair of Skylark were in suitable habitat, and a male Stonechat may or may not have been a migrant. A Raven over, and that was about it. 
 
It is looking a bit unsettled this coming week, but there are a couple of mornings that look okay, and the first Wheatears, Sand Martins and Sandwich Terns will be due this week. Something to look forward to.

Wednesday 28 February 2024

What Happened To February?

What did indeed happen to February, it seems to have disappeared in a flash! I started my last blog post by stating that it had been twelve days since my last post, so I have surpassed myself, because it has been 26 days now since my last post. A record for me, but not one to boast about! I haven't been lying idle, just the opposite, it's just I haven't found the time to sit at my computer for an hour or two. I will make every effort to improve going forward. And as spring is just around the corner, I am desperately looking forward to the first migrants making an appearance. For that very reason, Spring may well be my favourite season, but come back at a later date, and I might be saying the same about Summer or Autumn!

Since my last post, Gail and I visited our winter bird survey site, south of the River Ribble in West Lancashire, and it was fairly quiet. The period December - January is often the quietest with these surveys, with things hopefully picking up for the last two surveys next month. 

Our first survey was on 7th February under 6 oktas cloud cover, with a light east-southeasterly breeze. And for the first time in a while, we had a few Woodpigeons, totalling 81 birds, with 24 of their Collared Dove cousins. 
 
Collared Dove
 
Golden Plovers have been a feature over the last few visits, with flocks of birds generally heading high and west, and this morning we had 238 of these cracking waders. A flock of just eight Lapwings was only the other wader species we had. 
 
Lapwings
 
Lots of birds are starting to sing now, and Robins were very noticeable this morning, with at least 5 in fine voice. Eight Tree Sparrows is our highest count for the site so far, and is probably as a result of them getting a little bit more territorial as we edge closer to Spring. Four Little Egrets on this area of relatively intensively managed farmed land was a good total, and it was nice to see eleven Shelducks in one of the bare fields of black sand. 
 
Robin
 
Two species of raptor, a male Kestrel, and the best bird of the morning being a female Merlin flying over carrying food. Two Song Thrushes in song at the same time, and six Whooper Swans west, brought a pleasant few hours to an end. 
 
Whooper Swans
 
A few days later, we had a ringing session at our feeding station at Nateby, near Garstang. It was quite a bright morning with, once again, a light east-southeasterly wind, as we put the net up at the feeding station. We ringed 25 birds as follows (recaptures in brackets):

Redwing - 1 (first ringing record for the site)
Great Tit - 6
Blue Tit - 11 (4)
Chaffinch - 2
Tree Sparrow - 5 (1)
Dunnock - (1)

As we arrived, it was great to see a Barn Owl hunting over the camping field. Hopefully, the box will get used this year, as last year was the first year that they didn't breed at the farm for many a year. In fact, Robert has put a second box up in a different building in the yard. 

I have said before, that Tree Sparrows are the main reason for the feeding station, and in addition to the birds we ringed, there were at least 21 birds zipping backwards and forwards between the yard and the wood. 

Both Song and Mistle Thrush were singing, and a Great Spotted Woodpecker was at the feeding station. After we had packed up, we had a look on the wetland and there were 52 Wigeon, 50 Teal, two Shovelers and 85 Common Gulls in an adjacent field. 

On the 13th February we were back at our wintering bird survey site, this time with full cloud cover, but the wind was now a moderate southerly. Golden Plovers numbered only 60 flying west, but Lapwings had increased to 52 heading north. 

Surprisingly, our Woodpigeon count was exactly the same as last time, with another 81 recorded. Seven Stock Doves were the first for a while, and Collared Doves were steady away at 29. The numbers of Skylarks weren't as high as earlier in the winter, but the 16 that we recorded did include three singing birds. 

Linnet numbers had increased again, and we had a flock of 57, but only one Tree Sparrow this time. Three species of raptor were a Kestrel, Sparrowhawk and a Buzzard drifting east. The two Song Thrushes were singing again, and 20 Fieldfares in a flock of Starlings was a nice surprise. A male Stonechat added some colour to the dried grasses that it was perched upon, and seven Long-tailed Tits are worth mentioning. 

A few days ago, Gail and I carried out our last ringing session for the winter at our feeding station. As we put the net up, it was obvious that there were fewer birds, and also the two large feeders hadn't gone down very much. The two large sunflower heart feeders were empty, and they probably empty in one day. 

Our catch reflected the numbers of birds at the feeders, and we just ringed four birds as follows (recaptures in brackets):

Goldfinch - 1
Blue Tit - 1
Great Tit - 2 (1)

After we had packed up, we took the ladder into the woodland to take down the two trail cams we had up on two owl-type boxes. One camera captured a Tawny Owl looking into a chimney-type box, and the other some Stock Doves looking at the box where they nested last year. The aim of setting up the cameras was to see if we had any Grey Squirrels looking at the boxes, and fingers crossed we haven't! 

Our garden pond has been busy with Frogs these past few weeks, with a peak of six males last night. Six might not sound like a lot, but our pond is only 85 x 65 x 28 cm, so it is small. No females as yet, but both Gail and I, and the male Frogs, are keeping our fingers crossed for their return!
 
We carried out another rescue of a queen Buff-tailed Bumblebee a few days ago, but this time from our neighbour's drive. I was unloading some logs from the boot of my car, when I noticed her grounded on our neighbour's drive. I picked her up, and took her through to our garden. I made up a solution of one part sugar to five parts water, and fed her the sweet solution. After a few minutes of feeding, she started to buzz, and then she was up and away. Hopefully she will find somewhere to start a new colony soon.
 
Queen Buff-tailed Bumblebee. If you look closeley you 
can see her tongue lapping up the sugary solution
 
We received a phone call from the picture framers to say that our picture of a Ringed Plover, by brilliant Orkney wildlife artist, Tim Wootton, was ready to collect. When we went in, he said to me, "I think you'll like it, in fact I nearly kept it...lol". And the picture framer has done a fantastic job. I have posted a picture of it below, and I hope you agree.
 
 
These past few days has seen me building eight boxes for Pied Flycatchers for our nest box scheme in Bowland. I had two boxes in stock, so we have ten boxes available as replacements for any dilapidated boxes, when we carry out our maintenance check at weekend. I've posted some pictures of various stages of construction below. You will see that the first few shots were taken outside, as I like to build them outside if it is dry, so I can keep my eyes skywards for any birds going over. The final day when I was adding plates and fasteners, I had to work in my garage as it was raining. In case you were wondering, I didn't have anything of great interest flying over, other than a few Pink-footed Geese heading north.  






We received notification this week from the BTO about one of our Blackbirds. Ian ringed it in his Fleetwood garden on 14th September 2016, and it was found freshly dead in another garden in Fleetwood on 23rd February 2024, making her at least 7 years and 5 months old. When Ian ringed her, he aged her as a '3', which means that she hatched during the calendar year of ringing. So, she was probably at least a couple of months older perhaps, than the 7 years 5 months. 

The maximum age from ringing for a Blackbird is 15 years, 2 months and 5 days, set in 2000. The typical lifespan is 3 years, so 'our' Blackbird did well in reaching 7 and a half!

Friday 2 February 2024

A Good Deed

It has been twelve days since I last posted, and for that I apologise, but I have been busy getting all my natural history records up to date, for various individuals and organisations, via various forms of online submission. There are records for the British Trust for Ornithology (BTO) via BirdTrack, and records of mammals, butterflies, dragonflies and orchids can also be entered via this programme, records of moths and plants for the local record centres through iRecord, and then personal ornithological highlights for the County Bird Recorder. I have been out in the great outdoors, but I haven't had time to post on here. January every year is like this. 
 
Just under ten days ago, Gail and I had a walk from the Quay and along the Wyre estuary. It was one of those cold, grey days, and the tide had virtually covered all the mud in the Quay. A flock of 180 Redshanks were hanging on, with water up to their knees, and they would soon be pushed off. In fact, that was the ornithological highlight of our walk, other than a female Peregrine
 
Peregrine
 
On our way back to our car, I spotted something just off the path, from the corner of my eye, and I could see it was a Bumblebee. From her jizz, I could see that she was alive, but she certainly looked moribund. I picked her up, and carried her back to the car. She was a beautiful queen Buff-tailed Bumblebee, and it wasn't the right time to be out and about. On decent days during the winter, queens can emerge from their hibernation, but this wasn't one of those days, or it didn't look like it to me. 
 
Back at the car, Gail placed her in a small plastic container, and we headed home. We had to call in at Asda for a few bits of shopping, so we left her in the plastic container on one of the heated seats in the front. The plan when we got her home was to try and revive her with some sugar-water, and a warm, but this wasn't necessary. As soon as we reversed into the drive, she was very active within the container. She was buzzing beautifully, with that deep sounding, throb of a buzz that only Bumblebees make. As soon as I lifted the lid off the container, she was away. Our good deed for the day. 
 
A couple of days later I was at my wintering bird survey site, with fellow Ecologist Rachel. It was a bitterly cold morning, with a stiff WSW wind, but at least it was sunny. These wintering bird surveys in January are usually quiet, unless you are in a good coastal or wetland location, and this morning was no exception. I am just going to list the highlights from our three-hour survey, which were, ten Shelducks, 24 Whooper Swans, eleven Skylarks, 359 Pink-footed Geese, 29 Woodpigeons, 30 Linnets, 35 Golden Plovers, a Mistle Thrush, a Grey Wagtail, eleven Pied Wagtails, a Buzzard and a Kestrel
 
Last weekend, I headed to the Point for a sea watch, and to see what was roosting on the incoming tide. I had nearly full cloud cover, with a 15 mph south-westerly wind, and the visibility out in the bay was fairly poor. It's been a while since I had been here, and I had almost forgotten how awful the disturbance to the birds from people walking their dogs on the beach was. There were several people during the two hours that I was there, on the beach, with their dogs running around flushing everything. One dog in particular was out of control, and it would home in on a single wader and chase it for as long as it could, and then move on to another one. The owners were trying to control it, but it was completely ignoring any attempt they made to get it back on its lead!
 
All it would take, would be to cordon off a couple of sections of the beach at high tide where the waders roost, where no access is allowed over the high tide period, and the waders could then roost safely without any disturbance. Funnily enough, as I was walking off site, I bumped into fellow Pied Flycatcher enthusiast, Mark, who was recording any disturbance to the waders as part of some work for Natural England, looking at wider recreational disturbance in Morecambe Bay, so fingers crossed something positive might come out of Mark's surveys. 

Talking of waders, it always surprises me that some still manage to roost, and over the high tide period I had 87 Oystercatchers, 339 Sanderlings, 62 Dunlins, 55 Ringed Plovers, 74 Turnstones and two cracking Purple Sandpipers roosting with the RPs and Turnstones. Nice! 
 
Purple Sandpipers and Ringed Plovers
 
Mainly Sanderlings
 
The sea was very quiet, and all I had was 15 Cormorants, five Eiders, a Common Scoter, a Red-throated Diver, a Shelduck and 112 Pink-footed Geese heading north. 

Over the past few nights, we've had a froggy chorus coming from the garden, and on one particular wet night, a couple of evenings ago, the frogs were very vocal. So, we are hoping for some frog spawn and wee tadpoles in our little pond this year.

I was at my client's farm in Bowland a couple of days ago with a colleague from the RSPB. As Hilary and I were having a walk round some of the breeding wader fields, and looking at how the habitat was shaping up for the forthcoming breeding season, we had two Barn Owls constantly hunting, and this was at about 10:30 a.m. Of course, Barn Owls will hunt during the day, and there is usually a reason to force them out during these times, and I suspect that all the wet weather of late has been preventing them from hunting, so on this rare dry day of late, they will have been forced, by hunger, to hunt during full daylight. We chatted to John and Russell who are on the farm most days completing habitat works, and they have seen them quite a bit recently in the day, so I suspect they are indeed a pair of hungry owls. 

Gail and I had a walk along the Wyre yesterday morning, and it was another grey day, with a stiff westerly wind, but it did brighten up towards the end of our walk. A number of Teal and Wigeon were along the edge of the river, with 42 Wigeon close to us, but in the distance I could see a lot more. I was travelling light without my scope, so counts further away eluded us. 

The highlight of the morning was the interaction between a pair of Peregrines and a pair of Ravens. The Peregrines, particularly the larger female, were not happy with the close proximity of the Ravens, and every time one of the Ravens was more out in the open, the female Peregrine would stoop at, dive bomb, chase, and just generally harass the two Ravens. The Ravens were engaging in some courtship and pair bonding, and were stood side by side preening each other, or touching each other's beaks, and at the same time were making a kind of low warbling sound. I say 'warbling', because it was nearer a warble, rather than their usual harsh croaking call. Gail and I just stood spell-bound, soaking up this magical moment. It was the contrast between the drama of the battle between the two species, and the intimate moments between the two Ravens that made it so special. Eventually, the Ravens could only take so much of the sorties from the female Peregrine, and decided that it wasn't the place to try and get all romantic with each other, and flew off.  
 
Courting Ravens
 
Watchful Peregrine (above & below)
 
 
The forecast isn't looking great for the next ten days or so, and I seem to be saying that all the time just recently, but I'm sure there will be a window or two to get out and about.

Sunday 21 January 2024

Gulls

On Friday, Gail and I took part in the Winter Gull Survey (WinGS), as organised by the British Trust for Ornithology (BTO). WinGS is a long running monitoring programme which has taken place approximately every ten years since 1953, however there has been a gap of nearly twenty years since the last survey, so this latest survey is much-needed. The project's overarching aim is to provide robust information on the numbers and distributions of wintering gulls, many of which are of conservation concern, and appear on either the Birds of Conservation Concern (BoCC) Red or Amber list. 
 
Herring Gulls, but obviously not from Friday's Gull survey
 
The key count date for the survey is today, 21st January, but counts can be completed a week either side of this date. Gail and I opted to do our survey overlooking the Wyre estuary on Friday, 19th January, as the forecast for the weekend, particularly today was awful. And as I type, we have heavy rain with gale force south-westerly winds. I'm glad we completed the survey on Friday! 
 
The view from our vantage point
 
I'll jump straight to the results, and tell you that we recorded 51 Black-headed Gulls, 2 Common Gulls, 10 Great Black-backed Gulls, 1,029 Herring Gulls and 1 Lesser Black-backed Gull. During the survey we had 6 oktas cloud cover, with a 20 - 25 mph WSW wind. 
 
Luckily, we could shelter from the wind at the base of Fleetwood's Lower Lighthouse, affording us great views over the Wyre estuary. We surveyed from 1430 until 1640, and it was the last three quarters of an hour or so, where we had the most Gull action. Gulls, mainly Herring Gulls as you can see from our results above, were arriving on flight-lines and roosting on the sea out in the mouth of the estuary. 

However, there were far more Gulls roosting at three different locations that we could see from our vantage point, but these were well beyond the boundaries of our survey area. Thousands of Gulls were roosting at these three locations; King Scar Island, Cocker's Dyke and off Fluke Hall. 

King Scar Island, is a shingle island that has formed to the northwest of the Wyre Estuary, 3.8 km NW of our VP, probably since the date of the last WinGS. Looking west from our VP we could see streams of Gulls flying out to King Scar Island to roost, and the shingle ridge was covered in thousands of roosting Gulls. 

The two other large roosts were to the east of us, out on the expanse of mud and saltmarsh, at a distance of 3.4 km (Cocker's Dyke) and 5.3 km (off Fluke Hall), and again, well beyond our survey area. Just like King Scar, thousands of Gulls were involved, and I understand that somebody will be counting at Cocker's Dyke tomorrow. 

We had an enjoyable couple of hours, and besides the Gulls we had a few bits and pieces. As we were busy counting Gulls, we did not count the huge number of Oystercatchers on Great Knott on the other side of the estuary from us, but there were a lot! Other wader species included Redshank, Turnstone, Curlew, Dunlin, Sanderling and Grey Plover

In the mouth of the estuary, were four Red-breasted Mergansers, six Eiders and a Guillemot. The Guillemot was closely attended by two 2nd winter Great Black-backed Gulls, and was acting particularly menacing towards the Guillie. One individual Great Black-backed Gull made several attempts to attack the Guillemot, but the Guillie was a feisty little bird, and managed to fend off the attacks. As the Great Black-backed would hover over the Guillemot, the Guillie would rise out of the water, almost jumping in to the air, and strike at the Great Black-backed Gull. Eventually, the Gulls gave up, and flew-off, leaving the Guillie in peace. A female Teal flew out of the estuary and along the shore to our west, and as the tide was rising, 32 Wigeons headed upstream. 

The forecast is looking a bit mixed for the coming week, and if possible, we have a wintering bird survey to get in, but it's looking likely that it will be towards the end of the week, and we have to top-up at our feeding station as well. 

On this day in 2007, I had a rare trip north, with my friend Graham J, to see a rare bird near Callander in Perthshire. The rare bird in question, was a male Barrow's Goldeneye, and we had good views of it, eventually, as it displayed to a group of five female Common Goldeneyes. In addition to the Barrow's Goldeneye, we also had a few other good birds as well, including two Dippers, five Siskins, three Bewick's Swans, a female Goshawk, two Common Redpolls, a Red Kite and two Common Crossbills. Not bad for a few hours winter birding.

Wednesday 17 January 2024

Before The Snow

Down here on the Fylde we had some snow this morning. There is nothing significant about that, but it is useful as a demarcation as far as the blog is concerned in terms of the period covered by this post. As is usual for this part of Lancashire, the snow had virtually disappeared nearly as soon as it had settled! We are back to the windy, wet stuff now. 
 
Just about a week ago today, Gail and I were on the south side of the Ribble carrying out the first January visit at our wintering bird survey site. We had clear skies, with a light to moderate east-northeasterly wind, a ground frost, and it was quiet. With high pressure settled over the UK for a few days now, it has been pleasant to be out under the cold, wintery sun, but birds have been thin on the ground. 
 
At this time of year, the post-dawn movement of birds leaving their overnight roosts is very much kept to a minimum. We didn't have any Whooper Swans flying over this morning, but we did have a group of 46 feeding in a field to the north of our survey site. Along the edge of the dyke that forms the northern boundary of our site, we had a pair of Stonechats, and they were new in for the winter. 
 
Stonechat (male above & female below)
 

 

We follow our VP watch, by walking a transect, and on our return leg we came across a Starling singing his heart out from on top of a telegraph pole, and he was throwing a few other species into his repertoire. His song included elements of Blackbird, House Sparrow and Oystercatcher, and it was a pleasure to listen to him for a few minutes.
 
The cabbage field, that forms the main part of our survey area, had a few passerines feeding between the rows of rotting veg, and included 60 Skylarks, nine Meadow Pipits, 46 Pied Wagtails, 14 Linnets and a Grey Wagtail. A walk around the perimeter of this field added five Brown Hares and we also put up three Snipe
 
Interestingly, we didn't observe any geese this morning, but we did have eight Fieldfares, 40 Lapwings and two Little Egrets over.
 
At weekend we had a ringing session at the feeding station on our good friend's farm near Nateby, and we ringed 38 birds as follows (recaptures in brackets):  
 
Great Tit - 4 (6)
Tree Sparrow - 7
Siskin - 2
Goldfinch - 2
Robin - 2
Blue Tit - 11 (7)
Chaffinch - 1
Chiffchaff - 1
Greenfinch - 7
Nuthatch - 1 
Dunnock - (1)
Treecreeper - (1)
 
Siskin
 
Chiffchaff
 

Both Chiffchaff and Siskin were new ringing records for the site, and I think that the Chiffie was the first that I have ever ringed in January. 

A couple of days ago, we were back down by the Quay and on the Wyre estuary. It wasn't forecast to rain, but we had to shelter in the car for five minutes until the rain stopped! The tide was running in as we set off, and when we were back at the Quay just over an hour later, most of the mud was covered. The tide pushed any wildfowl out of the creeks, and pushed the waders on to ever diminishing areas where they could feed, and we had 105 Redshanks, ten Mallards, 23 Teal, three Black-tailed Godwits, a Curlew, 21 Wigeon (plus 77 'high' downstream) and 4 Knot

A male Peregrine was good to see, and we had a Siskin over, so perhaps the cold weather is moving a few of them around. 

We have got our Winter Gull Survey (WinGS) to do this weekend, and at the moment it is forecast to be wet and windy. Fingers crossed that it will improve before then, but there is some shelter to keep us out of the rain where we propose to count from. I'll let you know how we get on.