View From The Shed by Shaun Finnie - IT'S GETTING HOT IN HERE

IT'S GETTING HOT IN HERE

In days of yore Spoonbills bred quite happily in Britain; so much so that they were on the menu of every King, Lord and minor nobleman in the land. Want a fancy meal to impress your friends? Go catch ye a Spoonbill. Hmmm, no thanks. As is so often the case though, it would seem that those posh folks of the day got too greedy for by the year 1700 or so the baby Spoonbills of our isles were no more. We were devoid of all spoony chick life for several centuries until 2010 when a plucky pair had a holiday romance in Norfolk and the first British Teaspoons (yes its a real term) in over 300 years hatched. Things were about to change...

Parts of Norfolk and the southern end of England are quite used to seeing visiting Spoonbills most summers now. Look at the RSPB web page about them and it will tell you that you should go to the reserves at Wallasea Island or Arne for a chance of a sighting, both excellent reserves but both very much south of my Yorkshire home. These elegant large white birds have been regulars in those parts of the country for years but much less common here, “Oop North”. Of course there has been a small but reliable group roosting over at our Fairburn Ings site near Castleford for a few years now but here in the wilds of South Yorkshire we've generally had to make do with the occasional bird dropping in for a few hours of excitement for the local birdwatching community as it moves through on migration and that's been it. Until now. Last year a handful of birds visited around midsummer and stayed the rest of the season here at Old Moor. This year those same birds are back, and they've brought some of their mates along. And they've called in other friends too. It seems like every other day a new bird has arrived until we now have 14 Spoonbills happily living on my doorstep. And that's at the time of writing. Who knows how many there may be by the time you read this? We're not at the height of their migration season yet.

And we're not the only ones to be graced by their strange beaked presence. This summer there have been numerous sightings over the hills in Cheshire and Anglesey, and even as far north as RSPB Saltholme near Middlesborough. It seems that Spoonbills have discovered the North.

So what's going on? Why are they here at all, let alone in such numbers? There are now enough birds to be legitimately labelled The Dearne Valley Flock. Perhaps I should copyright that term before it goes viral. It makes me smile every time I tell a visitor where they are on the reserve and see the amazement on their faces. “But I thought they lived in Africa?” I usually reply that Africa's nice, but wouldn't you just once fancy Barnsley for a change?

It's true that many Eurasian Spoonbills spend their winters on the African mainland but in summertime they migrate northwards and can generally be found in the hot bits of mainland Europe; Portugal is a major breeding ground but also across the Iberian Peninsula and throughout the Middle Eastern States and on as far as Korea. Yes, there is a small hardy colony hanging on in Denmark too but mostly they like warmth and shallow lagoons and mud plains in which to feed. And therein lies the problem. I'm sure you've seen the news reports about how Portugal, Spain, Italy and much of the surrounding areas have been hit by terrible heatwaves in the last few months. Note – months, quite a few of them. The incredibly high temperatures in these countries have been ongoing and relentless, with a result being the shallow wetlands that Spoonbills need to survive have dried up. Their traditional feeding grounds just aren't there at the moment, so they moved to relatively cooler and crucially, wetter places. Welcome to Yorkshire and Lancashire, England's sponges.

And why the Dearne Valley in particular? Well over the last few years we've been working hard to make our sites attractive to the Heron family of birds, to which the Spoonbill belongs. We have lots of fresh shallow water full of tasty fish and other snacks and we also have a number of trees overhanging the lagoons for shade and roosting. Many other species in their extended family have settled in comfortably – Grey Herons, Little Egret, Great White Egret – and the Spoonbills have noticed that it's a safe place to land. Isn't this what we all want? Food, safety and living near to others like ourselves?

But of course there's our old friend Climate Change to contend with. The world is heating up, slowly but surely. Places where birds and animals have reliably found lots of food and comfortable temperatures may soon not be habitable for them. What is currently a one-off heatwave may become the seasonal norm. Does this mean that Spoonbills and others might become regular breeders in our vicinity? We've already had great success with another unlikely migrant, the Black-Winged Stilt family that can still be seen around our Edderthorpe Flash site. And the Night Heron that stayed for a few weeks at Adwick, just along the Dearne Valley, was very comfortable with his visit.

So which new species will we see at Old Moor next? Well apart from the birdlife, the one we'd most like to see is You. Come and say Hi to me or the other volunteers at the Welcome Shed. You'll have a great day – and you might even see The Dearne Valley Flock © .