In the bird world, April is the cruellest month – there’s tons of great stuff coming through on migration precisely at the same moment that the leaf canopy fills! Ah but then that’s when a new strategy is called for.
Trail behind any of the experienced visitors to the reserves and you’ll see them stop and appear to be doing nothing. What’s really going on is that they aren’t so much bird-watching as ‘bird-listening’.
Stroll along Old Moor’s ‘Green Lane’ at present and you might not ‘see’ all six-or-so species of songsters who are singing at the moment - but you will hear them!
Which reminds me, on Sunday 6 May, Old Moor hosts a Dawn Chorus Walk that includes both expert guidance on bird song and a bit of breakfast after! All the details can be found here.
Arguably one of the best singers at the moment – the humble dunnock
Old Moor’s Early Birders this morning reported one arctic tern, one Mediterranean gull, one dunlin, twelve oystercatcher, one common sandpiper, a redshank, one little egret, two shelduck and four swift.
As if that wasn’t enough, the early sightings were amended to include a single bearded tit, twenty more swift and a hobby. The latter drifted east, following after the swifts.
Messrs Law and Stones at Adwick Washlands today recorded: one black-tailed godwit, two male whitethroat, four wheatear, twenty-one avocet, one little ringed plover, two ringed plover, two oystercatcher, around twenty-five redshank, three grey partridge, three pink-footed geese and three pochard. Thanks John and Gary.
One of two shelduck on the Mere today
At Old Moor, in the Bird Garden and Tree Sparrow Farm today there were good numbers of bullfinch and at least one yellowhammer along with blue tit, crow, collared dove, dunnock, goldfinch, great tit, greenfinch, long-tailed tit, mallard, moorhen, pheasant, reed bunting, robin, stock dove and tree sparrow.
On the Mere this afternoon there were: four lesser black-backs, one Mediterranean gull, one great crested grebe, two cormorant, one herring gull, eight lapwing, four oystercatcher, two buzzard and eight sand martin. There were also Canada geese, greylag, jackdaw, mallard, starling, tufted duck and woodpigeon.
An inquisitive long-tailed tit this afternoon
Just behind the Family Hide, the small reedbed there, a reed warbler was establishing a territory – the first I’ve heard at Old Moor this spring.
On Green Lane the ‘six singers’ (do not try to say that fast) I mentioned earlier were: blackcap, chiffchaff, dunnock, song thrush, willow warbler and wren.
Finally, Wath Ings provided sightings of: one more cormorant, three little grebe, four oystercatcher, eight gadwall and eight pochard along with mute swan, tufted duck and goldfinch.
There were also coot chicks near the Reedbed Hide and both orange-tip and green-veined white butterflies around the gardens today.
I’ll sign off with another of Karen’s trail-cam pictures. Here she set up the remote camera to monitor the area between reedbeds one and five. Her suspicion was that a male bittern from reedbed five might be crossing from one reedbed to another.
As you can see, at five to six last Thursday she got her evidence. Nice one Karen!
Until next time.