Birds
November has seen some nice observations. Teal were seen on the lake with 5 pintail, 1 goldeneye, 2 wigeon, 12 common scoter, 2 little grebe and 1 red-breasted merganser. The dipper and the kingfisher were also seen several times in the lagoons. A chiffchaff was heard singing as late as the 1st November. A few woodcock were also seen in several places, with 2 snipe also seen on the 5th November. The largest flock of fieldfares reached 80 individuals. A willow tit has been repeatedly heard around the centenary hide. As many as 26 crossbill have been counted along with flocks of bramblings and 5 bullfinch. One black grouse was spotted on the moors and birds of prey have included 2 red kite, 1 goshawk and an immature sparrowhawk.
December was full of numerous woodcock sightings. The willow tit was still heard around the centenary hide and 1 female sparrowhawk was sighted on the 15th December.
Reserve Management
The past two months have been really wet and windy with regular strong gales. The rain gauges have displayed some unusually high levels with 639mm at Gadfa, along the Dinas Mawddwy road, in November and 734mm in December! The extreme weather has forced us to carry out trail audits and clearings sometimes several times a week. A few days were also spent repairing leaks in the hides. Many trees were blown down and the heavy rain made us spend a lot of time clearing ditches and gullies as the road around the lake was flooded in some places.
Photo shows the amount of water overflowing the dam (photo by Gavin Chambers)
Yet, we took the time to carry out other needed tasks such as hedge planting in some fields for the farm. The screen leading to the centenary hide has been patched up and several days were spent willow weaving to make sure the birds are not flushed when a visitor walks to the hide. Finally the interns with the help of volunteers have started the annual nest box maintenance program. A new numbering system was created involving aluminium tags with over 500 tags needed to be made this winter. Each nest box also gets emptied, repaired and renumbered.
Farm
The farm has been really busy in November turning the rams. In December, the ponies (around 40) got gathered from all over the moors to get health checked. These wild animals can cause quite an event when gathering them in and are therefore only gathered when absolutely necessary.
Photo of one of the friendlier ponies (photo by Gavin Chambers)
All of the replacement ewe lambs have gone away for the winter at the beginning of November and will return in April. They were taken to wintering pastures in milder climates where the food is more abundant. Before Christmas the ewes were sorted to their different lots for tupping (mating) with the first lot of lambs due in March. The Welsh Black cows have been housed and finished calving in December. A selection of ponies and wethers (castrated male sheep) has had their satellite collars fitted for us to monitor their grazing patterns on the moorland. We are now condition scoring, drenching (deworming) and starting to supplement feed in preparation for the lambing season and the ewes will be scanned now in the next couple of weeks so we will have an idea of how many barrens, singles, doubles and triples to expect.