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.

 

Oh Dear, How Sad. Never Mind.

I made it to Pilling on Friday morning and met up with Will for a spot of ringing. Another quiet session saw a catch of just 9 birds - 6 Linnet, 1 Sedge Warbler, 1 Chiffchaff and 1 Robin. 

The ringing was quiet but birding while sat in the warming sunshine proved immensely entertaining.  We saw two but possibly three separate Marsh Harriers, one in clear north to south migration, the other two patrolling the landscape. 

A Peregrine tried twice to catch Stock Doves and while the Peregrine failed to connect a Buzzard hung around just in case there were spoils to be had. 

A Sparrowhawk, 3 Little Egrets and 2 Grey Herons added to our sightings with small flights of both Wigeon and Teal in the mix. Linnet numbers are down with a low count of 50/60 made up of small parties between 3 and 8. 

The numbers are down in all respects from those of two and three weeks ago. We suspect that we have witnessed a juvenile dispersal of some magnitude and that there will now be a lull until the arrival of more Linnets when colder weather arrives.   

 

Chiffchaff

 

Sedge Warbler

Robin

Marsh Harrier

There are more birds, birding and photos to come.  Log in soon to Another Bird Blog.

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Meanwhile, there’s interesting and up to date news from Another Bird Blog’s Game and Sporting Correspondent. 

As a reminder and estimates vary, approximately 32 million Pheasants, 9 million Red-legged Partridges and 2.6 million Mallards are released into the countryside annually in the UK. The birds are released to provide ‘sport’ for people who live in or travel to the countryside. The released birds are subsequently killed during highly organised shooting occasions throughout the late autumn and winter months. 

This is known as Driven Game Shooting, a form of shooting more formal than simply walking with a dog alongside the hedgerows, and is usually confined to pheasant, partridge and grouse shooting.

On the shoot day, a team of shooters, or Guns, line out at numbered pegs. Meanwhile, under the gamekeeper’s instructions, a group of beaters and their dogs move through areas of woodland or covert, flushing the game ahead of them.

The aim is to get the birds to break cover and fly high over the line of Guns to provide sporting shots. Shot game is retrieved quickly by a picker-up who sends his/her trained gundog to where the shot game falls. Because of the organisation and number of people involved in a shoot of this sort, the financial cost to the Guns is considerably higher than in the other types of shooting.

Pheasant rearing

“Pippa, her posh pals, piles of dead pheasants and partridges... and some very pukka wellies” 

Daily Mail UK

The huge demand for the millions of young gamebirds (poults) reared for shooting in the countryside needs both home grown birds and imports from Europe. The largest exporters of gamebirds to the UK are France, Poland and Spain. France is by far the largest supplier of factory-farmed pheasants to the UK shooting industry with the Eurotunnel the main supply route for these birds. 

It seems that the price of Pheasant poults in particular is suffering from the same if not higher levels of inflation than the price of Waitrose avocados. Rearing birds requires labour, food, water, transport, husbandry, heating and energy, all of it getting more expensive by the day. 

In the early part of 2022 the industry worried that the price for a single poult might reach the dizzy heights of £5. 

During 2021/2022, France saw a high level of H5N1 Avian Flu outbreaks concentrated in the Vendee and Loire Atlantique regions - some of the main suppliers of game birds and eggs to the British game keeping market – as well as in French game birds themselves. 

The wave of cases in the southwest of France led to the culling of about 4 million birds, according to Reuters. There were 975 outbreaks of avian flu in the country between late November and March 2022. During this time France also experienced restrictions of movement and lockdowns of people and services due to Covid. 

This perfect storm of circumstances has seen the price of Pheasant poults imported to the UK rocket to near £10 a bird, a price that threatens the financial viability of UK shoots where attendance at even the smallest gathering may require a payment of £1,000 or more per person per day. 

It appears that some French producers who earlier in 2022 took orders from the UK have now reneged on deals or stated that they are unable meet new orders. The result is that as the shooting season of 1st September draws near, the price of a single UK grown poult for immediate supply was very recently quoted at £12.50 by a Lancashire supplier keen to fill the gaps in supply. 

A Gun

Organiser of shoots and their Guns worry they may have to cut down on the number of shooting days this winter.

Whatever happens from here on it seems likely that at the very least there will be less shooting this winter, with a corresponding lessening impact on the environment & countryside caused by the release of many thousands of factory farmed birds. 

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

 

Put The Kettle On

Readers will be pleased to know I survived the two day “heatwave” that only last week was projected to “kill thousands”. This is all very confusing because five or six years ago scientists predicted that “Earth is 15 years away from a mini ice age" when we would all freeze to death. 

For those of a nervous disposition likely to be triggered by the daily diet of doom and gloom served up by TV and newspapers, it’s best not to worry about the latest scam. Just like buses, you can bet there’ll be another one along very soon. 

Instead, take a seat, relax, put the kettle on and contemplate the next birding day. 

Keep Calm

This preoccupation with weather watching does occasionally make for the wrong decision, as we may have for Thursday when at the last minute we cancelled Thursday in favour of ringing on Friday. 

Friday dawned but there was no point in fretting what may have been but instead concentrate on the job in hand at our ringing site out Pilling way. It was 0615 when Andy’s car negotiated the rough track, where in my inability to sleep at the prospect of a ringing session, I had already set the Linnet net. 

With mid-week reports of early migrants including Yellow Wagtails, Whitethroats, large roosts of Sand Martins plus returning waders like Ruff and Greenshank, anything was on the cards in the slight, almost non-existent easterly draft. 

An hour or two later we had our answer when cloud rolled in, the breeze sprung up and drizzly rain enveloped us. This proved very frustrating as by then we had caught just seven birds, two each of Reed Warbler, Sedge Warbler and Linnet plus a single Wren. We saw 60/70 Linnets head our way and stop for a look as the single panel net grew increasingly balloon-like; there was no way the Linnets would fall for that. 

Sedge Warbler

Reed Warbler

Wren

A Wren or “wrigglearse” as ringers fondly name them, has a reputation as a tiny, troublesome beast, one that will wind itself into a mist net several times over or run up an unwary ringer’s open sleeved jacket. Twisty turning fidgeting Wrens are the best learning experience for a trainee ringer in how to handle small birds, lessons they never forget. 

However, Troglodytes troglodytes the cave dweller is an in interesting species and certainly more migratory than many bird watchers realise, hence the reason we catch the species. 

Click on the map below taken from the BTO’s phenomenal online migration atlas.

Eurasian Wren from -  https://migrationatlas.org/node/1822 map

We’ve hit a Wren sweet spot because today we caught another two Wrens plus 2 Sedge Warbler, 2 Linnet, a Willow Warbler, a Greenfinch and the ultimate rarity, a Song Thrush. 

Song Thrush

Greenfinch

We packed in early when contractors arrived to turn the cut grass in readiness for silage stage. The noise and disturbance from the huge machines made ringing almost impossible. 

On The Farm

We saw our first autumn Marsh Harrier when a brown juvenile followed the species’ usual route north to south and then disappeared into the distance. 

Marsh Harrier

Also, 2 Little Egret, 1 Kestrel, 60+ Linnet, 40 Lapwing, 30 Curlew, 300 Starling, 1 Great-spotted Woodpecker, 4 Pied Wagtails. 

I was home early so clicked the kettle on and dropped a tea bag into a favourite mug. Life is sweet when there’s nothing to worry about. 

There’s more news, views and photos soon from Another Bird Blog. 

 

Sixes And Sevens

Temperatures didn’t improve throughout the week. Although the days have been fine, the cold,  nagging easterly winds and cool daylight hours have definitely held back migration of insectivorous species. 

On Wednesday I met up with Andy for a 6 am start hoping that we might catch new migrants. We did, but 6 Sedge Warblers and 2 Great Tits was our sum total and by 10 am we had packed up as nothing much was about to happen. 

Perhaps the “best” bird of the morning was a Corn Bunting, singing from the same spot as a week previously. We suspect it has yet to find a mate so may not stay around much longer in what is now a Fylde landscape containing very few Corn Buntings. 

Otherwise, a single Willow Warbler did well to avoid our three nets. 

Sedge Warbler

 

Corn Bunting

 

During almost four hours we saw no Swallows, House Martins or Reed Warblers, three species that are normally here by this date. The slow spring and lack of Swallows this year seems to be a topic of conversation amongst birders and people who spend time in the countryside. 

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Gluttons for punishment we arranged to go up to hills of Oakenclough on Friday for another 6 am start. The morning was equally cold with the temperature gauge reading 2.5 degrees and a “possible ice” message as I set off for the 35 minute drive. 

We didn’t fare any better than Wednesday with just six more birds caught - 2 Willow Warbler, 2 Blackcap, 1 Blackbird and 1 Goldfinch. We had a good count of 12 to 14 singing Willow Warblers on site and we think that a good number of the later arriving females have yet to arrive and meet up with the Willow Warbler of their dreams. 

The two Blackcaps comprised one male and one female. The male was in an unusual stage of plumage with his cap still showing a lot of juvenile brown amongst the black cap. By April any juvenile brown from the previous year should have long gone. Although weight was normal, the overall plumage looked in a poor and weak state and we suspected the bird wasn’t in the best of health. 

Blackcap

Willow Warbler

The Greylags up here in the hills are quick off the mark to breed, seemingly oblivious to any type of weather. On Friday we saw two pairs with three youngsters each, pretty good going for 29 April. 

Greylags

 

There was a Kestrel hanging around for a while and then miracle of miracles, two Swallows put in a brief appearance by dive bombing the Kestrel. A pair of Pied Wagtails was on territory along the stone walls, a plot that they seem to keep throughout the winter. 

Kestrel

 

I know that next week will be better for both news and photographs. Tune in then. You will not be disappointed.

Billy No Mates

Saturday morning, 17 July. My usual ringing pal Andy is laid up for some weeks following his knee op this week. Regrettably that means he will lose his part time job as a Car Park Attendant as he won’t have the essential qualifications of a lop-sided limp - (his joke, not mine). There’s no way Sue will accompany me at 0600 and support the far end of a 60ft mist net while I tie the near end. She’s not keen to provide secretary duties either. Arrangements like that would probably cost me dearly in the way of a contribution to the Gordon’s Gin Empire. 

Fortunately Billy No Mates knows of a quiet place where he can sit in a shaded chair with a couple of mist nets up and also bird with eyes and ears, even though in mid-July there’s not a lot to see or hear. 

This venue is private with no one to trouble me except for the pesky sand flies that even through a shirt dig their needle teeth in as soon as they land. This is not a place to catch piles of birds but rather a place to watch the world go by and wonder how I have managed to stay sane for 18 months while the world around has gone completely insane. 

The seed crop isn’t quite ready to split and drop but already the mass of flowers hold a myriad of insects and creepy crawlies. It’s no wonder then that a single net through the crop catches insect eating Sedge Warblers and Reed Warblers that visit here from a reed bed fifty yards away. 

Seed Plot

Seed Plot

So here’s a quiz for clued up non-ringers or even ringers who see few “acros”, acrocephalus warblers. The two pictures below show two ages of Sedge Warbler, an adult (male as it happens) and below that a juvenile born in recent weeks. Which is which? The differing stages of their respective plumage provide the answer. 

Sedge Warbler - juvenile/first summer

 

Sedge Warbler - adult

 

Differentiating the ages of Reed Warblers is less easy. At this time of year one of the best and quickest methods is to examine the wear on the primary flight feathers, especially at the tips. Birds of the year look fresh, new and unworn, whereas the equivalent feathers of an adult will be slightly worn and bleached at the outermost points. 

See the two pictures below. 

Reed Warbler - juvenile/first summer 

 

Reed Warbler - adult

 

Reed Warbler

 

A stroll along the paths led to a locked gate and the farmer's sign “Bull in Field”, an essential to deter trespassers of many kinds.  As I looked over, the young bull stared back. He appeared d harmless enough with blunt, stubby horns and a kindly face, nothing like those steamy nostril Spanish bulls that trample bullfighters into the Iberian dust. 

Beware of the Bull

 

As docile as the hulk appeared it’s best to never approach a bull, young or old, especially if there are heifers around. I also know to steer clear of the occasional Galloway cow found in local cattle herds; given the chance they can get fairly obnoxious and chase unwary birders across a field. 

Half a dozen Reed Warblers, two Sedge Warblers and a Wren the sum total of my ringing efforts. Adult Reed Warbler AKH0265 was from elsewhere, further details will follow. A Common Whitethroat sat atop a nearby hawthorn bush, the berries green with youthful innocence and the “throat” an older male with a greying mop, a wise old bird that I didn’t catch. 

Whitethroat

 

Likewise an unexpected count of 35 House Sparrows and 40+ Swallows were my highest counts of both species this year. Sad to say not a single Swift crossed my path - a poor year for this species. 

And sad to say, no other warblers where I might expect a couple of Willow Warblers and /or Blackcaps. 2021 - What a strange year in many ways when this cold spring followed the abysmal weather, poor breeding and low productivity of 2020.  There are no finches in the seed plot yet because natural seeds of the countryside are abundant for now, but the variety of the seed plot will work its magic soon. 

All season I watched the secretive Tufted Ducks that gave nothing away as to where the nest might be. And then today the family, minus dad of course, toddled along the track and then dived off and into the pool as mom saw me ahead. 

Tufted Ducks

 

On the waterway also - 3 Little Egret, 2 Little Grebe, 1 Grey Heron.  An entertaining morning for sure, even if there was no one to talk to except the birds or myself. 

 

Diary Dates

How soon spring turns to summer, by the calendar that is, not the actual weather. May 2021 has been both the coldest and wettest on record up here in the Frozen North. Thursday morning was fairly warm by recent standards and I took the opportunity to visit a couple of spots out Pilling way. 

There was an Oystercatcher to check in the field where last week we ringed three Lapwing chicks. There may be more Lapwings to come from distant adults when they bring their young towards the coast via the path. And perhaps young Oystercatchers from the three egg nest located today.  Oystercatcher incubation is around 25 days, therefore, allowing for the uncertain days of laying, the date of egg hatching should be close to 13 June. I marked my diary with “Oyks Pilling”. 

Oystercatcher nest - May 27

 

A pair of Oystercatchers has just one breeding attempt each year. It is said that if at first they don’t succeed they do not try again, but as long lived birds, up to 30 years, they have lots of time to make up for unproductive years. 

Oystercatcher

 

Meanwhile and not too far away a pair of Pied Wagtails was busy feeding young, the nest hidden in a thick tuft of grass alongside a watery ditch. Both birds had hung around the same spot for weeks without giving much away.  The young were pretty big so were quickly ringed and put back in their nest, and then covered with a cloth for a couple of minutes so as to settle them back in their dark hidey hole. 

 

Pied Wagtail

Pied Wagtail

Along the same waterway was the now regular Great Egret, destined perhaps to spend the summer here out of sight and out of mind. Two Grey Heron but no Little Egrets.  Not far away was a single Wheatear, a remnant from recent migration and not likely to breed hereabouts. 

Part of the day's task was to find Skylarks, and plenty there were, upwards of 8 singers in several hundred linear yards so potentially the same number of pairs. Skylark nests are difficult to locate and May has been so cold and wet that the chances of finding active nests was close to zero. However I chanced upon a pair in the early stages of nest building below a fence post and entered another marker in the diary “Skyla East End 15 June.” 

In nearby reedy pools and scrapes were 6 Tufted Duck, 2 Little Grebe and many active Sedge and Reed Warblers zipping around the reeds and in and out of the vegetation. Like other species this year, the “Acros” were late to arrive, late to start but now seem intent on making up for lost time. 

 

Sedge Warbler

Reed Warbler

The Tufted Ducks involved themselves in some sort of group courtship behaviour which consisted of males sailing off over the water, closely followed by a noisily quacking female. That guy looks a little henpecked.  Maybe the picture is worthy of a caption contest - “Don’t be long. And what time will you be back?” 

Tufted Ducks

 

That reminds me. I have a few chores to finish.  Back soon.

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

Changing Places

I missed out on Monday’s ringing when Andy caught another 32 birds up at Oakenclough - 9 more Willow Warblers, more Blackcaps, yet another Garden Warbler and one each of Siskin and Lesser Redpoll. 

We decided on a change of venue today when a post-breeding flock of mainly Linnets looked too good to miss. For a week and more the Linnets had fed a quarter of a mile away from our Project Linnet site of Gulf Lane. The birds were using a further plot of set-aside adjacent to a recently collected field of barley,  now planted for a crop of rape seed and turnip. 

The car splashed along the track where recent rains had left very large puddles. There has been an awful lot of rain lately but thankfully this morning was dry and the grey sky soon perked up.  

Down The Track

Seed Plot

We set a couple of single panel nets through the seed plot and a single net in the nearby copse.

We were quite pleased with the catch of 17 birds containing as it did the target bird of Linnet plus a couple of surprises - 9 Linnet, 2 Sedge Warbler, 2 Reed Warbler, 2 Wren, 1 Pied Wagtail and 1 Lesser Whitethroat.

Lesser Whitethroat 

One of the Reed Warblers was a female in breeding condition. The second one sported the most magnificent fault bars through the tail. This obviously came about during one of the rain and windy spells of July when food would have been difficult to find for adults feeding young. 

Reed Warbler with tail fault bar 

Sedge Warbler - juvenile/first summer

Pied Wagtail - juvenile/first summer

Linnet

Other birds observed today. 40 Linnet, 8 Pied Wagtail, 2 Corn Bunting, 20+ Swallow, Willow Warbler, 8 Curlew, 2 Cormorant. 

We pencilled in Friday for another trip to Oakenclough.  Log in tomorrow evening to see how we did.