Bluebirds, Blackbirds, And A Song

All through October and November we looked, listened and waited for Fieldfares to arrive in the west when their size, colour and loud chuckling voices would send our eyes skywards in appreciative glances. 

The Fieldfare is not a species a wide awake birder can miss when the thrushes make it from Norway in their dozens, hundreds, even thousands and drop into glowing-red hawthorn hedgerows to then feast like there’s no tomorrow. 

Fieldfare

Maybe the constant wind and rain of autumn here in the west persuaded many to remain in the North East and then travel quickly south towards France and Spain rather than cross the backbone of England to warm wet Lancashire? 

Whatever the reason for the deficiency of recent weeks it was more than good to catch up with a small number of Fieldfares out Cockerham last week when the sun shone bright and Fieldfares looked their best. But for this interlude it might be February, March or April before Fieldfares make another appearance, this time on their way back to Northern Europe. 

 

Fieldfare

Fieldfare

In the days of the last century, before even me, the thrush we now call Fieldfare was known as Bluebird to distinguish it from its allies the Mistle Thrush, then named Greybird, and the accurately named Blackbird. 

As I focused on the Fieldfare’s multifaceted colours and clicked the button, I thought that Varied Thrush - The Haunting Voice of Ancient Forests, might be a more suitable name but posting pictures on the Internet of a Varied Thrush at Cockerham might cause a stampede through the narrow lanes.  For sure any such mistake, deliberate or otherwise, would upset local farmers and not help my notoriety among local birders. 

Near the top of the hawthorns up popped the ultimate rarity, a shyster; but no, not a politician, the timid, unsure, and now impossible to find Song Thrush. I couldn’t remember the last time I saw one, let alone a half chance at a picture, a species now hardly ever reported by local birders. 

It’s too late to rescue the British Song Thrush. We rip out hedgerows and blanket the countryside in concrete and white elephant windmills where Song Thrushes can’t live; but no one cares. Follow The Money. 

Song Thrush

 

The few Blackbirds around proved harder to picture than gregarious Fieldfares. The Fieldfares might sit there motionless for a minute, eyeing up a bunch of berries until they decided to eat while the Blackbirds stole through the black branches nicking a berry or two if they thought no one was looking. 

Blackbird

Fieldfare

Blackbird

I drove back through Pilling where roadside Lapwings, Golden Plovers and Curlews provided a background symphony of wild calls to the thrum of traffic going nowhere while seeing nothing. 

 

Golden Plover

Lapwing

Lapwing

Curlew

It’s always Lapwing to the fore, Curlews a little further away and Golden Plovers way back, 100 yards or more, out of sight out of mind, except to shooters. Yes in 2023, Golden Plovers are Schedule 2 species, which means that it is legal to shoot them outside the closed season and a feather in a shooter's cap to bag one.  

No one cares. Follow The Money. 

Sunny Days

Here in coastal Lancashire we’ve had no rain for four weeks and the summer is beginning to look like an old-fashioned one but where the inevitable thunderstorms are due this evening and into Sunday. This should remind us that this is Britain and not the Sahara Desert. 

It’s similar across the country where millions of people are out enjoying the weather, despite the UK Nanny State who think that the public cannot understand a weather forecast so choose to bombard us with Health Heat Alerts to ramp up the global warming scare at every bit of sunny weather. They really do take us for fools who they can continually scare, manipulate and thus control. 

On my Pilling travels on Friday it was hard to miss the dried out landscape and the lack of rain puddles in familiar places. Birds were laying low, many feeding young and others simply hard to find. Along a track lined with reeds and vegetation I found Common Whitethroat and Sedge Warbler, both still in song and seemingly yet to reach the stage of collecting food for nestlings. 

The breeding year was slow to start, an April and early May of cold northerlies and late arrivals of African migrants. Even now there appears to be a shortage of Reed Buntings, House Martins, Swifts, Swallows and even Wrens. Those of us close to the action think that there could be Avian Flu in passerines and small birds. But how would we know when millions of small birds die of both natural and unnatural causes and then simply go missing never to be found? 

The Whitethroat is pictured against a green background of newly growing maize crop, the Sedge Warbler against a freshly cut and now parched field of silage. The bokeh of the Sigma lens is really good at most times.

Sedge Warbler

Whitethroat

A couple of Lapwings inspected in turn a newly sown seed plot and then a two inch high maize crop. The Lapwings may have failed their first attempt at raising a family so may return and lay in what appears ideal and now undisturbed spots. If we get rain both crops will thrive and grow like giant beanstalks so it’s a hard decision for the Lapwings. 

 

Lapwing

Little Egrets have been thin on the ground just locally until one appeared below my slowly moving car hide. Along another ditch a Buzzard stood sentinel and then took off to circle and find the rising thermals. 

Little Egret

Buzzard

The cut silage field had half a dozen Curlews scratching a living on the rock hard ground. Even in the height of summer it is not difficult to find handfuls of upland waders that return quickly to the coast when their upland adventures turn sour. Soon there will be masses of both and it will be interesting to see how the inland wader season fared. Just last week Curlews gave me a hard time and something of the run-around when I tried to picture them in their other world, the uplands of the Pennine Hills.

Curlew

I found a couple of Oystercatchers hanging around on gate posts where they seemed unconcerned at my being close by as if they had no young in tow.

Oystercatcher

Once the rain leaves us there's a visit to the Sand Martin colony planned mid week. We need a light easterly and not much sun that will light up our mist nets. 

Log in soon folks. And enjoy the sun. Winter will come soon enough. You know it makes sense.

Linking today to Eileen's Blogspot.

 

Another Martin

Last week was Sand Martins, this week it’s their blue and white cousins House Martins. While it’s relatively easy to catch Sand Martins that nest in waterside tunnels or quarries, House Martins that build mud nests under the eaves of buildings present a more difficult proposition. 

That is the main reason why over the years since the early 1990s our own Fylde Ringing Group has captured just 43 House Martins but more than 1326 Sand Martins. 

The latest Birds of Conservation Concern report of late 2021 reveals that more than 1 in 4 UK species, including Swifts and House Martins, are now in serious trouble. The UK has lost over half of its House Martin population (-57%) since 1969 and the species is now “Red-listed” and in need of further and immediate study. 

On Tuesday morning an hour's drive took us to Dunsop Bridge, Bowland and a building owned by the water company United Utilities where House Martins nest under the low slung eaves just 12ft off the ground. The building sits alongside the rocky and free-running River Dunsop that hosts piles of insect food and also places where the martins can collect mud to build their homes. 

 

House Martin

We didn’t expect to catch many and knew that it would be adults only until late June and beyond. We estimated 10 active nests and managed to catch 9 House Martins. We’ll return later in the month and into July, August and September to see how the breeding season progressed and gather more data when we catch youngsters of the year plus more adults. 

Thanks are due to United Utilities for allowing access to their works compound and to the chaps on site who put up with us for a few hours at their place of work. We all enjoyed the sights and sounds of good numbers of Pied Wagtails, Common Sandpipers, Grey Wagtails, Swallows, Mistle Thrushes. Most of all we enjoyed seeing House Martins at close quarters.

House Martin

Mistle Thrush

By the time we drove back towards the coast the Trough of Bowland road was busy with cyclists, walkers and other vehicles. There was a roadside juvenile Curlew that posed for a photo but the sun was not in the best situation. Lots of Meadow Pipits were in evidence together with Oystercatchers, a few Lapwings, but sadly very few Redshanks. 

Meadow Pipit

Oystercatcher

 

Curlew

 

Back soon with more news, views and photos. The next ringing will be those Kestrels and a look in  the Barn Owl nest box. 

Linking today with Eileen's Saturday Blog and Anni in Texas.

Good Morning

I set off in the dark and drove towards Lancaster. The temperature hovered around zero under a clear starry sky that hinted at a sunny day. As it does so often, the morning began with a Barn Owl, but not in the usual spots. 

The owl was at Conder Green where it hunted over the areas of rough grass areas that surround the pools. I watched the owl for a while as it played hide & seek with the camera until it flew off towards Glasson Dock’s roadside barns. 

Barn Owl

The light wasn’t perfect yet but good enough to clock the wildfowl and waders where scans and counts revealed 28 Wigeon, 4 Little Grebe, 1 Goldeneye, 1 Grey Heron, 1 Little Egret and 48 Teal. There was no sign of the recent Green-winged Teal but my overall count of teal species was below recent averages whereby Teal are good at hiding in the reedy margins with the result that some remained unseen. 

Goldeneye

Waders were the expected handful of species that rarely changes in winter composition but fluctuates in numbers. Today all of them proved to be in a flighty mood - 65 Lapwing, 22 Redshank, 6 Curlew and a single Oystercatcher. 

Curlew

 

A Kingfisher obliged by sitting at the water spillway but briefly. Within a few seconds it was gone, skimming across the flat water to an unknown spot at the other end of the pool. 

Kingfisher

 

The few passerines around numbered 11 Long-tailed Tit, 2 Blackbird, 1 Dunnock, 1 Wren along the hedgerow, hawthorns that hold few birds, probably because there is constant disturbance from vehicles large, small and inevitably noisy in using the parking spot. 

Perhaps local birders can answer this question – where are all the unglamorous Dunnocks this autumn and winter? I have seen, heard and ringed very few all year. The species is even absent from the garden, most unusual. Theories please.

Dunnock

 

I took a drive up to Cockersands and picked up a few extra species that included a small flock of mixed Redwings and Fieldfares, about 30 birds in all that flew between tall trees and a single hedgerow. Near here and Gardner’s farm a Kestrel sat atop a roadside pole and approximately 130 Whooper Swans stayed noisy and distant. There are very few berries left now following a quite average berry crop this autumn. 

Redwing

Fieldfare

On the way back home a stop at Braides Farm found a rather decent if somewhat approximate number of Lapwings (500), Golden Plover (750) and 40 or more Redshank. I wondered why all were so difficult to count, very flighty and taking to the air for “nothing”, flying around and then dropping back into the fields. It was a Sparrowhawk, a large female sat on a broken down post in the centre of the mayhem where it watched for the opportune moment and a meal. 

I let the birds be then drove to Gulf Lane and the feeding spots we cannot work for ringing purposes because they are close to a case of Avian Flu in Preesall/Pilling. 

I dropped more seed on the ground for the count of 125 Linnet, 12 Chaffinch, 4 Blackbird, 1 Fieldfare, 1 Great Tit, 1 Robin and 1 Moorhen. It's very frustrating that we are barred from catching and ringing these small passerines. Let’s hope we can return to our ringing quite soon.  

Linnets

Back soon with more news, views and photos on Another Bird Blog. 

Linking this weekend to Eileen's Blogspot and Anni in Texas. 

 

Win-Win

I don’t normally have a leisurely breakfast, more a “grab it and go”. At 0630 on Sunday a steady drizzle rattled on the conservatory roof. It was rain enough to bang another piece of bread in the toaster, make a second cup of tea and wait for the skies to brighten. An hour later it was time to hit the road. 

The plan was the usual - a little birding over Cockerham way and hopefully a spot of ringing. 

I stopped at Gulf Lane where the farmer had promised to cut a swathe through his other seed crop in readiness for the first signs of a decent sized flock of Linnets. Richard had done a gret job with the tractor with a terrific 9ft wide path that skirted the ditch and the bramble patch where many birds frequent during August to May. 

Already birds were in the ride, foraging through the cut crop, along the fence posts or hiding in the hedge - 2 Tree Sparrow, 2 Reed Bunting, 2 Stock Dove and 18 Linnets. 

Tree Sparrow

 

Reed Bunting

 

Linnets

 

Win-Win

A good start to the morning that went slightly downhill as the previously slight breeze picked up enough to signify that ringing was a no-no. Not to worry as the big fields held many birds even if most were a little distant. 

The distance combined with the ebb and flow of birds constantly moving between the field and the marsh beyond made counting almost impossible. My best estimates were 750 Greylag, 200 Lapwing, 175 Carrion Crow, 90 Curlew, 25 Stock Dove and countless gulls, mostly Black-headed. 

Black-headed Gulls

Curlew

Constant activity was enough to draw in raptors in the shape of two Sparrowhawks and a Marsh Harrier. I was be sure of two Sparrowhawks because of their relative sizes, a small, fast moving male and soon after a larger female that circled around in a higher plane as females of the species are inclined to do. 

The Sparrowhawks were quickly followed by a Marsh Harrier, a somewhat nondescript bird of the year, which gave intermittent views as it hunted over and around the ditches, fields and few trees that dot the area. When Richard arrived on the quad carrying the morning breakfast of cattle nuts I asked “Where were you five minutes ago?” 

Luckily the harrier reappeared again to give us both splendid views until it drifted off south, over the A588 and in the direction of Winmarleigh Moss. Mid-August is a classic time to catch up with Marsh Harriers as they disperse from breeding sites north and east of here. In recent years Marsh Harriers have begun to winter on the Lancashire coast, Leighton Moss and Martin Mere/Southport/Merseyside. 

Marsh Harrier

 

Smaller birds were difficult to find with singles of Reed Warbler, Great-spotted Woodpecker, a handful of Goldfinches and about 20 Linnets max. A single south moving Swallow was the only one noted. It's really autumn now. 

After a dismal start the few hours spent in the Great Outdoors proved to be a winner - again. And who wouldn’t rather be birding?  

Linking this weekend to Eileen's Saturday Blog and Ann in Texas.

Food For Thought

Saturday was cool, blustery and showery just like the week gone by when there was no birding and no ringing. Hopefully the showers would not turn to rain and I could at least get a little birding done. 

With so few Swallows of late one could be forgiven for thinking they had all left for Africa with a cold arctic wind up their backsides. Not so, because at Conder Pool many hundreds of mainly Swallows converged on the morning hatch of insects. My approximate count was of 450 Swallows, 40 Sand Martins and 30 House Martins which swarmed along the north bank in the lee of the hedgerow, across the water and over the island’s vegetation for two hours or more. 

This feeding frenzy is a regular autumn occurrence now the waterside hedgerow is mature enough to hold large numbers of midge and mosquito type insects - little critters that we call ‘gnats’ or ‘flies’, some of which are actually mosquitoes. 

Yes, I heard them this morning and “mozzies” are definitely in Lancashire. I’ve seen, heard and then squashed enough mosquitoes in Africa, Asia and the Med to recognise the sound of their landing approach.  It was so satisfying to hear the snap of the Swallows’ bills as another enemy bit the dust a yard from my face and to watch as thousands more perished in the birds’ onslaught. 

Swallow

 

Buoyed up by the merciless carnage I periodically turned my attention to other birds present and their less obvious need to eat at the pace of early morning hirundines, creatures who spend dark nights balancing on draughty reed stems. 

In 1981 in North Lancashire I saw my first Little Egret, a species that very quickly found a niche, swelled in numbers and is now so ubiquitous that it can be seen 365 days of the year, winter, spring, autumn and summer.  This species should by now be renamed as Common Egret, rather like Common Man - the average citizen, as distinct from the social, political or cultural elite. 

These delicate little diners eat mainly fish, with at times amphibians, small reptiles, mammals, crustaceans, molluscs, insects, spiders and worms. There were three egrets today, and as I watched they seemed to prefer the tiny fish that inhabit the pool, but mostly the prey would be swallowed in the blink of an eye before it could be named. 

Eight Little Grebes took their prey under water but when one emerged carrying a ready meal it was invariably the same minnow the egrets take. 

 “Minnow is the common name for a number of species of small freshwater fish, belonging to several genera of the family Cyprinidae.” 

Little Egret

 

To their credit, our local Mute Swans appear to be vegetarian. But, like many a “veggie” they occasionally, and entirely by accident, when no one is looking, have been known to sneak the odd meaty mollusc or worm. 

Mute Swan

 

Waders and wildfowl were of the usual variety and numbers with 40 Lapwing, 20 Redshank, 15 Curlew, 3 Common Sandpiper, 1 Greenshank, 6 Tufted Duck and 40 Teal. 

Those Curlews can be missed when they feed amongst this year’s grasses, grown tall and lush in record rains. I suspect that beneath the puddles lay soft soil containing goodies that curved, probing bills could easily find. 

Redshank

 

Common Sandpiper

 

Curlew

It was good to see a flock of 50/60 Goldfinches feeding in both the marsh grass and on the dandelions and thistles. Good to see because Goldfinches have been strangely absent from my own garden for weeks, not unexpected when there is much natural food about. 

Goldfinch

That’s all for now.  I’m off to prepare a chicken tandoori with salad. There's more food for thought soon on Another Bird Blog. 

 

Mink Encounter

With a dry sunny morning but a 20mph stiff northerly there was no chance of a ringing session at our exposed ringing sites. 

I set off for the usual birding spots with the car heater turned to ‘max’ and four layers on top. Summer had turned to autumn with a vengeance. 

Braides was first stop where an unplanned pool appeared during summer rains after the farmer’s levelling went awry. Fifty-five Curlews were dotted around the margins of long grass with a couple of Swallows hawking for early insects. Along the track in the distance I saw 3 Little Egrets and a single Grey Heron. 

Curlew

 

I pulled in at the lay by at Conder Green and almost immediately heard Green Sandpipers – in the plural. In fact there were four together in the creek and not the more usual, a single one on the pool margins or a dark, almost black, white-rumped bird flying fast and furious. The morning was already becoming a reprise of a visit here 9 days ago when I saw two, possibly three ‘green sands’. 

The sandpipers were very skittish, a trade mark behaviour of the species. Within a minute or two they had flown noisily around the creek out of sight. They took a feeding Common Sandpiper along too.  

Green Sandpiper

I stood quietly at the viewing screen hoping that something would come close. A Kingfisher flew up to the top of the marker post, now a favourite spot with water of the preferred depth for fishing. It didn’t linger more than a minute when something spooked the 150+ Lapwings dotted around the islands.  In turn the Lapwings spooked the Kingfisher.

Lapwing

 

Kingfisher

The early hour saw many hirundines feeding in the shelter of the hawthorns; approximately 120 Sand Martin, 30 Swallow and 15 House Martins. Pied Wagtails fed on the early insects too with 20/30 dotted around but highly mobile. 

Out of the corner of my eye I spotted a sizeable animal moving around the base of the platform and below the screen. First thoughts were of the most likely, a rat or a ferret but as the animal turned, stopped and stared up at motionless me I realised it was a mink, just a yard or two from my feet. Damn, it was too close for a picture from a 600 lens so I borrowed a pic from Wiki. 

Mink - Wiki

The animal slipped away into the hedgerow that borders the site and I didn’t see it again. I’d never been so close to a mink before but saw now that they are of a similar size to a ferret or polecat. Smaller than an otter and of an overall nondescript brown colour except for a softer, paler face. 

After that encounter everything seemed an anti-climax, but for the record books; 2 Little Egret, 15 Redshank, 12 Curlew, 8 Tufted Duck, 6 Little Grebe. 

Two weeks of bad weather has meant no ringing, but there’s a session pencilled in for Monday at Oakenclough.  Log in Monday evening to see Another Bird Blog’s next encounter.

Linking today to Eileen's Saturday Blog and Anni in Texas.