Guest blog by Matt Parrott
Shortly after opening the Visitor Centre on Thursday morning, John Grant phoned in to say that he could see a bee-eater circling over the edge of the scrape. Nothing causes a mass exodus of staff, volunteers and visitors from the Visitor Centre like a rare bird report – it helps keep us fit too!
In my little bird book I’ve had since I was four years old the bee-eater shares a worn and, I confess, a slightly coloured-in page, with the equally exotic roller and hoopoe – birds I have yet to see.
A stunning bird, if you can see it, and I failed miserably at the first try, as it drifted past the scrape towards the woodland. Then it was seen again, perched on wires by Whin Hill, and I was too late. Then back over the car park (so Senior Site Manager Adam Rowlands can claim it as a garden tick) and all I saw was blue sky, empty but for a soaring hobby. I’d almost given it up, until I heard from the Waveney Bird Club’s ringers that the bee-eater was perching near one of their nets.
The Waveney Bird Club provide a fantastic bird ringing demonstration on Thursdays during the summer holidays and Easter, not only carrying out vital science work but showing visitors some wonderful species at close range. They use mist nets strung in sections of the reedbed and woodland that birds get caught in as they fly through, and the ringers quickly but carefully remove them, note down information from their leg rings or attach rings if the bird doesn’t have any, before releasing it.
From the data we then know where the bird has come from, it’s age, health and vital statistics, and then can be used to influence conservation work to protect the species.
Having caught a pretty little pied flycatcher earlier the ringers were already having a good day, so I wandered down with Steve Piotrowski and the ringers as they went to check a net on the edge of the woodland. Great green bush crickets watched our progress through the humid bracken, until with a hushed yelp of excitement the bee-eater was spotted, perched in a silver birch.
For those unaware of what exactly a bee-eater is, imagine a slim blackbird-sized bird that couldn’t look more vibrant or exotic if it tried – turquoise belly, yellow nape, shimmering bronze head that flows into a yellow back, emerald green highlights on the wings, long tail and around the brown eyes, and the ‘lone ranger’ black stripe that curves from the beak over the eyes.
Funnily enough it eats bees – I love an obvious name! Not only bees, but wasps, hornets and ants too, but only if they’re flying. Once caught the bee-eater bashes the insect against a hard surface like a tree branch to remove the venom from the insect’s sting. They have very little effect on bee populations and in studies in Spain were found to eat less than 1% of worker bees.
Bee-eaters are scarce migrants to the UK, but in recent years they have bred in both the Isle of Wight and Carlisle and it is possible they could become a more common sight as the climate changes. Last year 10 bee-eaters were seen in a flock moving between nearby Leiston and Theberton.
By the late afternoon the bee-eater was still soaring distantly over the woods to the enjoyment of visitors on the North Wall.
Bird ringing with the Waveney Bird Club will be taking place again next Thursday 25th August 10am-4pm, Free event but entry fees apply to non-members.