Sounds of Africa - in Conwy's reedbeds

April has dawned with its typical weather of sunshine and showers. But between the rain and hail, new birds are arriving and Spring bird migration gets properly underway.  So, what's the consensus about arrivals so far?

The first sedge warbler (Friday 8th) was earlier than the average, though not our earliest (5th April 2011) - thanks to Dave Williams for the photo. A fly-over yellow wagtail (Sunday 3rd) was very early - our previous first was 14 April 2013 - and the first white wagtail was on 28 March, but April is the month for larger numbers to stop here and feed before they continue their journey to Iceland.  The first willow warbler was on Sunday 3rd, two days later than our previous earliest (in 2009, 2010 and 2014). Yesterday morning (Saturday 8th), there were dozens of willow warblers all over the reserve, feeding on the ground and in the reedbeds, a sure sign of birds on the move, brought to earth by overnight rain. By contrast, wheatears have had a slow start to their migration, with just a handful of birds, though there are three along the estuary today.

Good numbers of sand martins have been feeding over the lagoons each day, with smaller numbers of swallows and house martins. The first blackcap was singing its sweet song on Tuesday (5th)

On the water, wildfowl have started their nesting season, and there are now half a dozen Canada goose nests on the islands. Our great-crested grebes have built a nest in reeds opposite the Coffee Shop, and it's in a reasonably sheltered spot, so we hope it will be successful. We rarely see duck nests, so the first sign is fluffy chicks on the water; our first mallard ducklings were spotted on Friday (7th). Our water rail survey this week found six calling birds in the reedbeds.

But April is a cross-over month, so expect to see 'winter' birds for a few weeks yet. A couple of goldeneyes were still here today (Sunday 10th), pochards until Wednesday (6th) and a few wigeons are still here.  Passage birds this week include stonechat (Saturday 9th), greenshank (Thursday 7th), water pipit (Wednesday 6th) and lesser redpoll (Tuesday 5th).

Newts, frogs and toads are all visible in the ponds, and there are a few dark-bordered bee-flies during warm and sunny moments. Volunteers Rob and Ruth have started the weekly insect surveys, and found five different species of Queen bee nectaring on the willows this week: buff-tailed, white-tailed, red-tailed, early bumblebee and common carder bee. We've seen a few wasps too!