The team have been out listening and looking for breeding birds over the last few months, and now we’re at the end of summer it’s time to gather in the results to see who’s been quietly rearing their families at Fairburn Ings. It’s not an easy task - this year it’s taken a team of thirteen people (and some very early mornings) to scour every inch of Fairburn Ings.
It’s really important that we know how many and what birds and wildlife are living and breeding at the reserve as it lets us know whether all the lopping, strimming, sawing, digging, planting and chomping (that last one’s not us, that’s our trusty Highland cattle and Jacob’s sheep) that we’ve been doing out on the reserve is creating the right homes for nature.
So, time for a very brief overview of the results! A whopping 73 species of bird bred at Fairburn this year, and we’ve even recorded a few new breeding species. Siskin are a lovely sight at our feeders in the colder months, but they usually head west and north to breed. However, this year a pair decided Fairburn would make the ideal home to raise a family. Likewise, the tiny goldcrest is a regular winter visitor to the reserve who decided to stay to breed, and a male was heard singing throughout May.
The most numerous breeding species was cormorant, with 86 pairs counted nesting in the trees at the Moat Heronry, followed closely behind by willow warbler with 78 pairs. The sweet, descending song of the willow warbler is a common sound around the reserve in springtime, you can’t miss it! Other big breeding numbers include reed warbler (70 pairs), chaffinch (62 pairs) and robin and wren (50 pairs). But it’s not all about the biggest numbers! We’ve some very important birds breeding at Fairburn – birds whose numbers are declining throughout Britain, which makes them central to our work at the reserve. We recorded 12 pairs of nesting lapwing, 37 pairs of skylark, 3 grasshopper warblers reeling away, 3 pairs of linnet, 18 pairs of tree sparrow and 10 pairs of song thrush. And, I must mention our two booming bitterns at this point – despite being heard throughout the spring we don’t think bittern successfully nested at Fairburn this year as we had no sign of the regular flights that the females undertake when feeding their young. However, the booming vocal talents heard in spring go down as a breeding attempt, and with the bitterns doing so well at nearby St Aidan’s we’re hopeful we’ll have some young bitterns fledging from Fairburn in years to come.
There are still plenty of baby birds around Fairburn at the moment - why not pop down for a look? You could even enjoy a cuppa on the balcony while you watch the hustle and bustle of youngsters around the feeders.
Photo of fledgeling blue tits by Ernie Janes (rspb-images.com)