Sat With Swallows

I haven’t a lot to report today. My walk on the patch was quiet in the strong east wind, but to be positive, a wind with some east in it is always more productive for bringing migrants, but it often takes a day or two to provide the goods.

From Lane Ends heading west towards Pilling Water I noticed a number of Meadow Pipits arriving from across the bay, then as I walked further more jumped out of the grassy sea wall where they both fed and sheltered. By the time I reached Pilling Water I counted 22 Meadow Pipits and 5 Wheatear with a few of each fence hopping behind the sea wall.

I found parties of both Linnets and Goldfinches today, about 35 and 30 respectively, but only 1 Pied Wagtail. The wildfowlers have now released their Red-legged Partridge, as I found when, as the first person along the wall today, I caused a rush of panicked wings en masse as about 120 birds made for the safety of the pools; little do they know the fate that awaits them at their refuge.

After that I didn’t venture near the pools for fear of causing another fright of both partridge and duck so I watched about 40 Swallows and 10 House Martins feeding over the pools and the dyke as a Greenshank hurtled in from the marsh and a Little Egret floated out in the opposite direction. A circling Sparrowhawk distracted the hirundines from feeding for a while before they went back to the sheltered ditch and the abundant insects. So because it was a nice sunny morning and not a lot happening otherwise, I sat down near the Swallows and watched the recently fledged young ones resting but also watching and waiting for adults with food.

Swallow or Barn Swallow

Well let's face it, they won't be around much longer so let us enjoy them while we can.

Windless Wednesday

Since the weekend Will and I did our homework via the regular crowd, The Met Office, XC Weather, Wind Guru and the BBC. You name it, we’ve looked at it, so we pencilled in a hopeful Wednesday window for a ringing session. They were all correct as the wind dropped from a raging westerly at 9pm last night to a big fat zero at 6am this morning when we landed at Out Rawcliffe.

The morning was fairly slow as we expected now that many warblers have gone, but we hoped to pick up the stragglers plus anything else that came along. We certainly found some variety with 17 birds but of 14 species, 12 “new” birds and 5 recaptures. Of the first timers we caught one each of the following: Tree Pipit, Yellowhammer, Jay, Sedge Warbler, Whitethroat, Reed Bunting, Great Tit, Coal Tit, Blue Tit, Robin and Wren, with 2 Chaffinch.

Recapture were made by 2 Willow Warblers and 1 each of Chiffchaff, Wren and Great Tit. The Willow Warblers and Chiffchaff were adults with almost completed moult so will very soon be on their way south.

The quiet ringing left time to survey the scene without the need to shelter from wind or rain but simply to sit in the sun, that strange yellow thing in the sky that we see occasionally.

Jay - juvenile
Tree Pipit - juvenile
Yellowhammer - juvenile
Reed Bunting – juvenile male, partial moult
Sedge Warbler - juvenile
Chaffinch
Blue Tit

Following the overnight clear sky the morning’s visual migration was very thin, the highlight probably a single Swift heading south west in a light movement of Swallows and House Martins. We did notice a number of Chaffinches about this morning, “pinking” and contact calling as they flew over or dropped into the plantation. They are a sure sign of the real autumn to begin soon.

Chaffinch

The inevitable Marsh Harrier put in a showing as it patrolled the set aside but at one point had to fend off the attentions of a Buzzard that spotted the harrier taking a rest in a recently cropped field. Two other Buzzards today plus a single Kestrel completed the raptor scene.

Buzzard

An Evening Surprise

Early morning wind put paid to ringing Sunday morning, but the promise of calm winds for later in the day led to an evening exercise at Out Rawcliffe in trying to catch a few Swallows as they fed over the newly harvested fields close to the plantation; also we hoped to pick up a few warblers. Will, Craig, Ian and I met up at 1730 as we put up a few nets and waited for Swallows whilst the wind dropped out completely.

We saw Goldfinches arriving in twos and threes, fives and tens but then as feeding Swallows appeared from the west and the north on their way to their maize roost somewhere in the direction of St Michaels village, we noticed that amongst the circling Swallows were large groups of Goldfinches. We had stumbled upon a Goldfinch roost of maybe 300-400 birds as from all directions birds made their way into the plantation to spend the night. We didn’t catch any Goldfinch because we hadn’t set nets for them in the deeper parts of the trees, but a bonus catch came in the form of 2 Sparrowhawks, a male and a female, which were clearly intent on having a Goldfinch or two as an evening meal, and as Sparrowhawks do, had found and probably exploited the roost.

Sparrowhawk - juvenile female
Sparrowhawk - juvenile female
Sparrowhawk - juvenile male
Sparrowhawk - juvenile male
Sparrowhawk - juvenile male

By now there were several thousand Swallows in the distance, as even those around us ignored our nets and headed off with some urgency towards the river and St Michaels where they joined the several thousand birds already in the air.

We did catch a single moulting adult Blackcap and 2 Swallows but the evening surprises left us with a couple of tasks: 1) plan a catch of Goldfinch for another evening, and 2) pinpoint the Swallow roost in the many acres of maize fields around St Michaels.

Swallow
Goldfinch

The evening hadn’t quite finished as from the direction of the massed Swallows a Marsh Harrier rose from the ground and gave us an evening fly past in the half light as it headed off north in the direction of Pilling Moss.

Marsh Harrier

That definitely beats staying in and watching telly.

Stopped For A Chat

The chat in question was a Whinchat, now as scarce in these parts as hen’s teeth. I was watching 3 Wheatears near my traps when a juvenile Whinchat popped up on the fence behind the United Utilities paraphernalia at Pilling Water. It’s now one of those birds that no one passes by anymore but instead stops to take a closer look. Apart from seeing several migrant Whinchats in Menorca in May it was my first Whinchat of the year, and I don’t expect to see many more this year because their population has suffered a dramatic drop in recent years.

Whinchat - courtesy of Jorg Hempel

I didn’t catch any of the Wheatears but they removed at least one meal worm without getting caught, then hung around for a time watching for more easy pickings, but stayed clear of the now reset spring traps. Birds are definitely cleverer than we humans give them credit for.

Wheatears

Apart from the pleasant Whinchat surprise things were much the same this morning with along the shore 5 Pied Wagtails, 4 Meadow Pipits and 15 Goldfinch but the reappearance of more than 30 Linnets. The wildfowler’s pools held a Green Sandpiper, 2 Greenshank, 1 Snipe and at least 200 Teal with 3 Blackbirds emerging from the maize cover and 2 Collared Doves diving in for a feed.

Blackbird
Pied Wagtail
Teal
Collared Dove

Along Broadfleet and the outflow I counted 2 Common Sandpipers, 1 Cormorant, 1 Grey Heron and 3 Little Egrets. Feeding along the ditch and adjacent fields were approximately 90 Swallows and 10 House Martin, at one point paying some attention to a spiralling Sparrowhawk that drifted over towards distant Fluke Hall into more hirundine aggro. It was about now that I heard the deep croaking of 2 Ravens as they passed quickly overhead heading south east.

Common Sandpiper
Cormorant

When I got back home staring at the blank sheet of the blog I wondered what on earth I could write as I had seemed to spend an inordinate amount of time watching Wheatears and the Whinchat. But then I looked at my notebook and realised the variety of birds I had actually logged whilst mainly stopping and staring. Maybe that old maxim about letting the birds come to you holds more than a grain of truth and that dashing around in pursuit of birds isn’t nearly as much fun or as rewarding?

Double Tops

It was a very quiet walk to Pilling Water, a blank page in my notebook apart from ever present Kestrel at the entrance to Lane Ends or the loud Chiffchaff calling in the eye level trees.

When I arrived birdless at the sluice gates at least there was a Kingfisher to look at when one sat on the parapet wall, but as usual it saw me before I could lay binoculars on it. Then what brilliant views I got in the early morning light as the bird flew out onto the marsh a little before circling then flying back over the sea wall and around the pool as it looked for somewhere to settle. It got better as a second Kingfisher joined in the pool circuit before they went separate ways, one along Broadfleet towards Pilling village, and the other towards the wildfowler’s pools. Out of the breeding season Kingfishers are solitary animals, defending a feeding territory and only occasionally sharing a location with another bird, so I can only think that in late August these two may be of the same family from this summer or I had just witnessed a territorial battle. Whatever the reason it’s not every day I see two Kingfishers careering round together, it was a cracking start to the morning and fears about a Kingfisher winter wipe-out may be unfounded.

Kingfisher
Kestrel

My meal worms arrived yesterday so this morning’s first task was to find the Wheatears that hung around Lane Ends all this week and catch one or two. Of course now I had the meal worms, no Wheatears. But while everyone likes seeing them as in the first picture below, ringers also think that as well as being nice to look at a highly migratory species like the Wheatear can provide lots of scientific information.

Wheatear
Wheatear

After Kingfishers most things are a bit of an anti-climax so despite a Greenshank, a couple of Little Egrets and a westerly movement of 30 or 40 Swallows, I struggled to find much to look at and headed north.

Along the shore I noticed a lot of Marsh Samphire - “The Poor Man’s Asparagus”, as it is known. I believe that samphire is now a very trendy vegetable that you'll have to pay good money for; in London no doubt. Samphire (or glasswort, as it's also known) isn't really sea-weed, but it grows in the tidal zone, on muddy, sandy flats, often around estuaries and tidal creeks.

Some years ago when Lane Ends was a ringing site, before the combined Wyre Borough and Environment Agency neglect cocked it up, there was an old chap who would come along in the autumn and head off up to Cockerham with a bag to harvest the shore where he said the best samphire was. But of course being an old Pilling sort he wasn’t for saying precisely where he got his free grub from, but there’s certainly plenty to go round at the moment.

Samphire

It was quiet too at Conder Green when I looked from the platform, with 2 Spotted Redshank, 2 Common Sandpiper, 2 Greenshank , 48 Lapwing, 2 Grey Heron, 1 Snipe, 3 Curlew and the Goldfinch flock of 10 or 12 alternating between the thistles and the hawthorns.

The Saturday morning road was getting busier so I sought solitude at Cockersands where I encountered what appeared to be a joint caravan and a dog rally, plus a guy having a wash in the front seat of his caravanette, parading his Y Fronts for all to see. Despite this revolting distraction I set to determinedly with a quick look and count. I watched the tide run in for a while, with 13 Eider, 130 Ringed Plover, 250+ Dunlin, 700+ Oystercatcher, 30 Redshank, 15 Curlew and the highlight, a single Whimbrel.

Goldfinch
Curlew

It was an early finish then but also the end of the ill-timed hosepipe ban and a chance to earn some brownie points with a bit of car washing. And it sure looks better than the other one I saw getting a spruce up.

Mini

Scarce Or What?

It was our first opportunity for ringing for a while at Out Rawcliffe and the mornings are a bit easier to bear now with a 0545 start for Will and me.

Just on the perimeter of the farm I was reacquainted with a Little Owl at a previously regular spot from which they disappeared during the severe winter weather and then to not show at all through the spring and summer. Perhaps it’s a new bird, a juvenile moved into a vacant territory or one of the old birds that has actually been around all the time? If we catch it we will know.

Little Owl
Little Owl

Walking through the plantation in the half-light with our gear produced a Tawny Owl which flew up the centre track and then out of sight to roost up elsewhere. We don’t catch many Tawnies unless we work winter roosts when the owls get active as soon as it’s dark. Our mist netting proved uneventful with not much evidence of many new birds on site or moving through as warbler migration dries up a little. We caught 14 birds of 9 species, 10 new and 4 recaptures.

New: 1 each of Blue Tit, Great Tit, Chaffinch, Blackbird, Whitethroat and Goldfinch, the latter a fairly recent probably second or even third brood juvenile; also 4 Willow Warblers.

Recaptures: 1 each of Whitethroat, Sedge Warbler, Willow Warbler and Chiffchaff, the latter two were both adults in heavy complete moult.

Whitethroat
Goldfinch
Birds in the plantation that we didn’t catch included a Jay, a couple of Chaffinch, several Goldfinches, plus a family party of late brood Whitethroats.

Whitethroat
Chaffinch

Birding was also pretty quiet, the rarest bird being Grey Partridge that called from the wheat crop. We had new sightings of a Marsh Harrier as it hunted distant fields, but this species is now almost more common in the last few years in the Fylde than the poor Grey Partridge, especially since the harrier moved from being a scarce visitor to the area 20 odd years ago to become nowadays a local breeding species. Here is yet another very poor photograph of a very distant harrier but from this morning.

Marsh Harrier

“Others” seen this morning were 2 Tree Sparrow, 2 Kestrel, 2 Buzzard, 50+ Swallows, 10 House Martin, 1 Skylark and 2 Reed Bunting.