What is a morning without a Pilling walk along the sea wall that blows away the cobwebs? It was a rerun of the day before but with Common Sandpipers now morphed into 4, Pied Wagtails into 10 but the same Skylarks and single Meadow Pipit in song. A dashing Sparrowhawk flew through a gap in the trees of the wildfowler’s pools then almost immediately I could hear that the Blackbirds at least spotted it. And as Blue Peter might say “Here’s one we caught earlier”.
Thursday, July 8, 2010
Fast And Furious
What is a morning without a Pilling walk along the sea wall that blows away the cobwebs? It was a rerun of the day before but with Common Sandpipers now morphed into 4, Pied Wagtails into 10 but the same Skylarks and single Meadow Pipit in song. A dashing Sparrowhawk flew through a gap in the trees of the wildfowler’s pools then almost immediately I could hear that the Blackbirds at least spotted it. And as Blue Peter might say “Here’s one we caught earlier”.
Wednesday, July 7, 2010
Trying
As it rained this morning I spent a while reinstalling a slide show for the RH column of the blog after the previous one broke for no apparent reason. I hope readers new and old like the new version; all the pictures at higher resolution can be found somewhere on previous posts.
The rain fell most of the morning and then kept showering as I ate a sandwich while looking hopefully west through the conservatory windows for a hint of brighter stuff. Then after lunch I risked the continuing showers for a walk along Pilling shore where I received a little soaking but at least I got out for a while, but with not much to report I’m afraid.
At Lane Ends the Tufted Duck recently bred successfully and today the female looked after three young while the young Greylags are now as big as their parents.
I heard the Blackcap singing again plus two Reed Warblers today, one alongside the road and the other below the car park, and whilst Reed Warblers are able to breed in just small patches of phragmites reed, I’m afraid the unmanaged woodland is about to engulf the few patches of reed left. Little Grebes were around because I heard their trill but there are so many hiding places I rarely see them.
I walked towards Fluke hall to the sound of two singing Skylarks and the displaying, singing Meadow Pit I saw a few days ago, the one that carries a BTO ring.
I sat on the wet stile at Pilling Water and surveyed the shore and inland towards Pilling village. Three Common Sandpipers hugged the outlet ditch together with a couple of Redshank, a still brightly coloured single Black-tailed Godwit and a couple of Oystercatchers. There are still a number of Pied Wagtails on the marsh, today I counted just six, plus the comings and goings of several Linnet, and just below me two Greenfinch.
I watched as an overflying micro light put to flight the waders further out on the marsh, 130 Curlew and 60 Lapwings. As this happened I think an opportunistic Kestrel took advantage of the disturbance and confusion to snatch a small Redshank chick from underneath the noses of the parents, and the falcon flew past me and over the wildfowler’s pools out of sight with its dangling prey. Hirundines and Swift numbers were more normal today with about 60 Swallows, 20+ House Martins and 25 Swift feeding over the marsh, sea wall, and about Pilling Water itself.
My mammal highlight today was a brief sighting of a Stoat closely pursued by a youngster, a “kit”. My views were very brief as the animal stood up momentarily to look at me then ran off, still followed by the youngster and I had no chance of a picture. Trying to watch wildlife can be very frustrating sometimes, trying to photograph it even more so.
Tuesday, July 6, 2010
Quality Street
We caught 49 birds, 35 new and 14 recaptures of 8 species. New birds were:
Willow Warbler 10
Sedge Warbler 3
Whitethroat 10
Goldfinch 8
Blackbird 1
Treecreeper 1
Dunnock 1
Great Tit 1
Recaptures came as:
Willow Warbler 4
Whitethroat 4
Sedge Warbler 6
We caught our first juvenile Sedge Warblers of the year, fresh and yellowish, looking so different from the whitened adults with plumage now worn by their travels in the early year and the demands of a breeding season.
We also caught a few Goldfinch which appeared barely out of the nest, short winged, short tailed youngsters but obviously independent enough as they flew off strongly in small parties of adults and juveniles. Whilst this went on around us we found Goldfinches at a different stage with a nest containing five eggs.
Two juvenile Whitethroats with consecutive ring numbers we recaptured this morning had actually been originally ringed in a nest in the plantation on 9th June.
The actual birding as distinct from the ringing was very quiet this morning with no visible migration and the new birds caught today can be ascribed to post breeding dispersal of juvenile birds and moult dispersal of adult birds.
On the lepidoptera side of things we did find a cache of eggs on nettles this morning. A quick trawl of the Internet identified these as Small Tortoiseshell - Aglais urticae I think.
Saturday, July 3, 2010
Saturday, Saturday
I looked at http://www.xcweather.co.uk/ which suggests that Tuesday may be better for a ringing expedition. Here’s hoping.
Friday, July 2, 2010
It's Just A Hobby
As I arrived at Lane Ends about 80 Curlew came off the inland fields, flew over the plantation and landed out on the marsh where they joined the autumn gang of 120 or so Lapwings. The walk up to Pilling Water proved uneventful with just the usual Skylarks for company as I cursed the early morning brightly clothed walkers for beating me to the pool again, but it was 9am I suppose.
Sat on the stile I noticed a scruffy looking Barn Owl hunting the fields and ditches alongside Fluke Hall Lane and the margins of Pilling Water. At that hour on a bright sunny it could only be hunting for food for youngsters, and I watched it for about 15 minutes alternately quartering the ground or sitting on the lookout fence posts. It was very scruffy, but I suppose I might be if I had been sat on eggs in the confines of a dark smelly box for some weeks. In actual fact there is nothing quite like the smell of an end of season owl box full of growing young with their left overs of discarded and rotting food items and sometimes the left overs of the smallest owl eaten a week or two before by its larger siblings.
That brightened my first hour or so before the owl flew off towards Fluke Hall, but it was so quiet I could hear a Whitethroat singing from the distant sewage works at Damside. Back at the sea wall end I noted 2 Common Sandpipers along the outfall and a lone Golden Plover, with 9 Pied Wagtails scattered across the marsh with small groups of Linnets that totalled up to a miserly 14 birds. A Meadow Pipit has started singing again at the junction of the sea wall there, and I am sure there is a nest close by as it let me approach it fairly close while calling to its mate. I noticed it had a ring on the right leg but it is more than a few years since I ringed any “mipits” just there, so I need either to carry a scope or catch the bird with meal worms to find out its place of ringing.
A Grey Heron sat along the inland dyke where Swallows and House Martins fed. From the stile I was fairly certain that besides the local hirundines, other Swallows and House Martins were on the move south, with a single Sand Martin joining in the feeding out over the marsh, with Swifts noted here as going west and numbering 40, Swallows 70 and House Martins 30. The resident breeding Redshanks and Lapwings still protested at my presence even though they had obviously moved their young further out on the marsh, so I tried my hand at Redshanks photos again, but the results weren’t as good as a few days ago.
At Lane Ends car park I dumped my heavy camera bag in the car to watch the seeming inactivity out on the marsh. As Lapwings and Starlings mixed in the summery length grass I waited to count them, concentrating instead on the numbers of Swifts flying at all heights but mainly heading west with more Swallows and extra House Martins. Something spooked the Lapwings and Starlings into the air “en masse”, the regular autumn/winter Merlin or Peregrine, but early I supposed. Then an adult Hobby came fairly slowly from the right along the sea wall in front of the mound, pursued and almost surrounded by complaining Swifts and Swallows, then disappeared behind the plantation with an entourage of twittering birds. By now I revised my morning count of Swift to 90, Swallow to 80 and House Martin to 45. My Starling count was 240, Lapwing 170. Hobby isn’t a major rarity here, in fact they do breed in Lancashire but it’s always a special day when one surprises you unexpectedly.
Although everything went quiet I waited for a while to see if the Hobby might reappear. After about twenty minutes the Lapwings, Starlings and hirundines spooked again as the Hobby came in from the direction of Fluke Hall at a much faster pace, did a Swift impression, then continued off towards Cockerham where I lost it in the sky.
That’s a good morning’s birding, and it was 1130 already. How time flies when we’re having fun.
Wednesday, June 30, 2010
Tools Of The Trade
The Chaffinch is obviously one of the regular garden visitors. Note the ring, right leg. Wow the picture is nearly good enough to read the number!
My garden is absolutely crammed with Goldfinch at the moment. This bird has to be one of the most successful British birds of recent years, most of it due to its sheer adaptability and the fact that it has become a very common garden bird.
I swear the branch of the silver birch sagged when this fat young Woodpigeon landed on it. The thing isn’t long out of the nest but wasted no time in joining the others in searching out local gardens.
This Jackdaw is clearly up to some villainy, like nicking all the peanuts.
Even the young Great-spotted Woodpeckers waste no time in searching out my nuts!
Now I must get back to the chores, where did I put that paintbrush?
Monday, June 28, 2010
It's King Harrys Again
The BTO have just informed the ringing group of a very similar recovery. Will and I caught a ringed Goldfinch at Rawcliffe Moss on 17th April 2010, the bird bearing a ring number we hadn’t used X818575; we are informed this bird was originally ringed in Kintbury, Berkshire on 31st January 2010, distance in this case 292kms, so it looks like this bird also wintered in the south of England. Interestingly it was during February, March and April of 2010 when there was a notable influx of Goldfinch to this part of Lancashire when we caught 15 new Goldfinch in February, 32 in March and 44 in April.
Interesting results like these two which both add to and confirm existing facts make all the early morning effort seem worthwhile.