It has been quite a quiet week mainly due to the weather which has now become very wet as well as cold. The lake has certainly been topped up and is again overtopping the dam. However bank holiday Monday was a nice day and there was plenty to see around the reserve on my day off. A walk along the first section of the Red Trail (a lot of forestry work at the moment) produced singing Garden Warbler, Whitethroat, Tree Pipit and the briefest of reeling Grasshopper Warblers. There was also a flock of about 40 Crossbill flying around looking for food which they tended to head for Beech trees. As early breeders it was no surprise to see several juveniles amongst the flock.
Female Crossbill along Red Trail (4th May – Gavin Chambers)
Then to the Yellow and Blue Trails where pairs of Pied Flycatchers were guarding their nest box as they build their nests. Plenty of Willow Warblers and Chiffchaff around with a few singing Blackcap hiding in the shrubbery. Best of all was the sound of a Wood Warbler singing its wonderful trilling song, sadly a sound that is disappearing from some parts of the UK. At the top of the Blue Trail a flash of red indicates the Redstarts were about and a couple of Pied Wagtails looked like they wanted to find a nest site. No Goshawk this time but still a good route to take if hoping for one and looking for a good variety of bird species.
Singing Wood Warbler around lake (4th May – Gavin Chambers)
The uplands are a great place to see Chats. If you stop along the Dinas Mawddwy or Bala roads you are quite likely to see a Stonechat, Whinchat or Wheatear. Chats are showy birds, liking to sit on prominent perches like a fencepost or small sapling and all have a very similar ‘chat, chat’ alarm call which can be the first indication of their presence. A few Stonechat fledglings have been seen this week and given their recent dramatic decline after a couple of hard winters, 4/5 years ago, it is a good sign of a recovery, they may also have a second brood.
Whinchat along Dinas Mawddwy road (9th May – Gavin Chambers).
Other sightings have included a couple of adult Hobby over the moors on the 7th May, a pair of Mandarin have been seen a couple of times on the River Vyrnwy and just off the dam and there has been a trickle of hirundines (Swallows and Martins) and Swifts moving through the reserve with many feeding over the lake before moving on. The Otter has again been seen a couple of times at the top of the lake. I managed to miss it by a few minutes from the Centenary Hide today (9th) where a couple had just filmed it walk right in front of the hide!
Plant of the Week
Crowberry / Creiglys y Mynydd (Empetrum nigrum) (Photo by Gethin Elias). Grouse and other moorland birds feast on the black glossy fruits of the Crowberry when it ripens in late summer. The plant is also the main source of food for the caterpillars of several months. Crowberry flourishes in the uplands often alongside Heather, Cranberry and Bilberry. The edges of the shiny leaves curl down and inwards to form a narrow tube, a device that reduces the loss of water by evaporation through the pores on the leaf surface. I often hear people mixing Crowberry and Cowberry up. I remember them by the shape of the leaf, Crowberry is like a crows beak and Cowberry has a wide leaf like a cows tongue.
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