The reserve is brimming with the sound of young birds at the moment. Whether it be the first fledgling robins or song thrushes which are now independent of their parents who are busy with a 2nd brood. Or the high pitched chattery peeps of a family of long-tailed tits as the youngsters learn how to forage for tiny insects by hanging upside down on oak leaves; there is a lot of life on site. The black-headed gull colony has a fair few chicks, of varying ages. The gull colony are a great early warning signal for the other families on the wetlands, sounding the alarm when a lesser-black backed gull or carrion crow fly through and on mass seeing off the intruder. The avocet pair are another vigilant duo against attack, chasing pretty much anything that dare come close to their 4 chicks! They are still favouring the muddy edges nearest the lookout so if you visit this weekend you may well get a good view of them.
3 of the 4 avocet chicks by Steve Pick
Lapwings, oystercatcher and redshank have broods pottering around the north pit, benefitting from the avocet and black-headed gull early warning protection system!
The cuckoos have been performing quite well this week. At least 2 male cuckoos are chasing each other and at least one female making her bubbling call has been seen. We have also been watching the cuckoos going into the reeds on Jubilee and Fishers Mill, probably staking out reed warbler nests to lay their eggs into. Cuckoos are one of several declining migrants that Winter in the humid zones of Africa, with reasons for their decline still unclear. One possible contribution is the reduced availability of their moth caterpillar prey – lots of our larger moths populations are in serious decline. Moth caterpillars such as tiger moths, which are sometimes called woolly bears, are becoming a rarer thing to come across, although I did have to stop mowing the other day as one crawled from the grass I was going to cut. After that I didn’t carry on with that patch of grass and left it long!
A pair of garganey are loitering around, they have been seen on the river recently but are flighty and elusive. Checking the larger gulls paid the rewards this week when a Caspian gull was picked out on Jubilee. Interesting waders this week have been a summer plumaged Sanderling and a single ruff at the weekend plus 20+ ringed plover knocking about between north pit + jubilee. A couple of barnacle geese have been on the north pit along with the unseasonal wigeon pair and a pair of teal which is interesting as they could be breeding in one of the many quiet corners of the reserve. A red kite drifted lazily over Fishers Mill last night, heading south towards Kingsbury water park.
Although it has been quite cool and breezy, not the best sorts of conditions for dragonflies, broad-bodied chasers and four-spotted chasers are on the wing at the moment. Checking the edges of ponds with suitable emergent plants can reveal their larval casing, called exuvia, which the adult dragonfly emerges from. We were lucky enough to find this (I think it’s a 4-spotted chaser) resting on it’s exuvia, having emerged from it.
Newly emerged dragonfly by Kate Thorpe
Our dragonfly surveys last year produced 16 species of damsel and dragonfly around the reserve. Hopefully we will add more species to the list as some move north (small red-eyed damselfly aren’t too far away) or habitat becomes more suitable.
We will endeavor to keep this blog updated on a weekly basis, but to keep your finger on the Middleton Lakes pulse check out our RSPB Birmingham, Black Country and Warwickshire facebook page and follow us on Twitter @RSPBMiddleton. If you enjoy taking photos, we would love for you to add them to our Community page. To keep up to date with Middleton and other sightings in the valley check out the tame valley birding blog http://tamevalleybirding.blogspot.co.uk/