Here is Michael Walter's latest report:
As is so often the case, initial high hopes for a good breeding season fizzledout as winter’s icy grip returned and birds struggled to find enough food for themselves, let alone for their chicks. Migrants, freshly returned from Africa must have been totally bemused, wondering why they made that long, arduous and risky journey when they could have stayed in the tropics. But come they did, and it looks as though it will have been one of the best ever seasons for returning nightingales, though it was unfortunate that many of the males were singing lustily in areas far removed from the main visitor trails, their gorgeous outpourings unheard by humans much of the time. I haven’t yet analysed the raw data from my early morning surveys, and until that has been done it will be difficult to be dogmatic about this year’s ups and downs, though it does appear that the declines greatly outweigh the increases. Most worrying of all is the virtual absence of marsh tits, easily the rarest of the five tit species that nest at Blean. I can’t even confirm breeding this year. This is all the more disturbing because the willow tit, a very closely related bird that is almost impossible to differentiate from marsh tit in the field, apart from by call, became extinct on the reserve in the late 1990s, having always been the scarcer of the two species here. It has now been lost from Kent.
There is some good news, though: after years of assuming buzzards were now resident in the wood, I finally found a nest in May, and a kingfisher whistling along the stream the same day raised my hopes that a pair could be nesting here, as happened four times in the late 1980s and early 1990s. In autumn the adults force their own youngsters out of the parental stretch of stream, and at that time of year these homeless wanderers can turn up almost anywhere, but in spring there are no displaced young birds looking for somewhere to call home, so any bird seen is likely to be on territory, which is simply another way of saying that we probably have kingfishers nesting on or very near to the reserve. In case you’re wondering where they would excavate their nest burrow, there are some surprisingly suitable little “cliffs” on the sharp bends in our rather small stream, so lack of nest sites shouldn’t deter the most glamorous birds to be found in this country. Another, albeit rather short-lived, thrill came when I heard a very brief call from a golden oriole. With the male’s bright yellow body, black wings, blood-red beak and eye ring, this bird is definitely competing with the kingfisher for title of the UK’s most exotic bird. A short-lived colonisation of the woodlands around Canterbury in the 1970s and 80s sadly died out, and now there is just the odd pair breeding in East Anglia, so it was no surprise that “my” bird didn’t hang around.
It has been an exceptionally good year for flowering lily-of-the-valley. There are several very extensive swards of foliage, which can be best seen from the black/red/green trail on the way back to the car park, but in most years just the odd plant here and there produces its fragrant flower, so it was really pleasing to see so many blooming this month. Although normally thought of as a garden plant, it grows wild scattered across England and may well be native. It has certainly been established in Blean Woods for hundreds of years.
Events at Blean Woods this spring and summer
Wildflower Walk Sat 18th June 10.00-11.30
Butterfly Walk Sat 9th July 1.30-3.00pm
Photos below show Lily of the valley and a marsh tit