Recent sightings from 30 December 2019 to 05 January 2020
Starlings remained a main draw thanks to them staying around much longer than last year when they left the reserve at the middle of December. Whilst the numbers are down to around 5.000 to 10.000 now, they did indeed show some nice murmurations which mainly took place over the reedbeds towards the lighthouse. There was also a staggering amount of birds once again to be found on the mudflats. An estimated 5.000 dunlins could be seen flying around in huge flocks and feeding on the mudflats. There were also hundreds of curlews, black-tailed godwits, lapwings and redshanks. All in all, eleven different species of waders have been recorded along the foreshore this week including oystercatcher, snipe, knot, ringed plover, up to 29 grey plovers, common sandpiper and one bar-tailed godwit on Saturday. If you add avocet, turnstone and spotted redshank which have all been spotted from Goldcliff this week, then this brings the total to 14 species of waders. The best time of the day to see the waders from the coast path was around an hour before high tide. Peregrine and sparrowhawk both showed an interest in the clouds of birds as did a merlin on Thursday morning. The numbers of wildfowl were on the up as well with good numbers of shelduck, shoveler, teal and wigeon present along the Severn Estuary. Four male and one female pintail were an exciting sighting on Tuesday. On the same day a remarkable 480 wigeon have been counted on the coast off Goldcliff. Flocks of linnet were a regular feature along the coast and on Monday a lesser redpoll was seen in amongst them as well. There were a good number of reed buntings, too. It was a decent week for thrushes as well. Fieldfares were seen in some sizeable flocks, blackbirds were around in big numbers and song thrush, mistle thrush and redwing were all spotted. Siskin, goldcrest, rock pipit and stonechat were other nice sightings in regard to the songbirds. The new year started with 67 recorded species on one day, not a bad start into 2020 at all! The lagoons held more than 30 gadwall on New Year’s Day and the marsh harrier was once again seen flying over the reedbeds. On most mornings you could see a pair of them flying in the distance from the café window. The bittern has been spotted in flight on a daily basis from Tuesday onwards. Green woodpeckers remained a common sight, the kingfisher paid a brief visit to the scrape on Thursday and a whooper swan was recorded flying over the reserve on Tuesday. Two birds which are not often seen were spotted this week with a woodcock flying past on Monday and water rails seen on no less than three occasions (two of the sightings were from the hide). Highlights at Goldcliff lagoons were a female goldeneye, the “usual” peregrine, two barnacle geese and the glossy ibis which has been a regular at Goldcliff for more than a year now. A black-necked grebe on Sunday secured an exciting end to the week at Goldcliff lagoons. Unfortunately, the otter sightings have dried up a bit. It was seen on several occasions throughout the day on Monday, then we had to wait to get it back on the sightings board until Sunday. Stoat and weasel could both be seen running around on the reserve. There were also some quite unique close-up views of two animals on the café decking which were without a doubt highlights of this week. On most days a beautiful pied wagtail was coming to look for scraps on the café decking in the late afternoon and seemed to enjoy our company as it came as close as around 20 centimetres away from us, seemingly completely calm and relaxed. During the weekend we had another completely calm and relaxed visitor just before closing time: a young fox. Even for an urban fox that one seemed very tame indeed and even seemed to enjoy the flashlights of the cameras as it decided to sit down only a few metres away from us. Whenever you are lucky to get so close to wild animals without causing them any stress or disturbance and when indeed they are coming closer and closer to you because they decided to do so, then these are very rare and special moments! A happy, successful and healthy new year to all of you with hopefully lots of great and exciting wildlife moments!
There are still some spaces available on our Birdwatching for Beginners Guided Walk on 26th January. This will be a great opportunity to get an insight into the pleasures of birdwatching. If ”getting more creative” is one of your New Year’s resolutions, then join award-winning author Lucy Christopher on the Creative Writing event on 1st February. On 2nd February we will celebrate the World Wetlands Day with a guided walk to find out more about this important ecosystem. If you want to get more into the waders and wildfowl – of which there are plenty at the moment as described above – then our Wetland and Estuary Waders Guided Walk on 15th February is exactly the right event for you. Details of all our events can be found on our website: https://www.rspb.org.uk/reserves-and-events/reserves-a-z/newport-wetlands/
Avocet, Barnacle goose, Bar-tailed godwit, Bittern, Blackbird, Black-headed gull, Black-necked grebe, Black-tailed godwit, Blue tit, Bullfinch, Buzzard, Canada goose, Carrion crow, Cetti's warbler, Chaffinch, Collared dove, Common sandpiper, Coot, Cormorant, Curlew, Dunlin, Dunnock, Fieldfare, Gadwall, Glossy ibis, Goldcrest, Goldeneye, Goldfinch, Great spotted woodpecker, Great tit, Green woodpecker, Greenfinch, Grey heron, Grey plover, Greylag goose, Herring gull, House sparrow, Jackdaw, Jay, Kestrel, Kingfisher, Knot, Lapwing, Lesser black-backed gull, Lesser redpoll, Linnet, Little egret, Little grebe, Long-tailed tit, Magpie, Mallard, Marsh harrier, Meadow pipit, Merlin, Mistle thrush, Moorhen, Mute swan, Oystercatcher, Peregrine, Pheasant, Pied wagtail, Pintail, Pochard, Raven, Redshank, Redwing, Reed bunting, Ringed plover, Robin, Rock pipit, Rook, Shelduck, Shoveler, Siskin, Snipe, Song thrush, Sparrowhawk, Spotted redshank, Starling, Stonechat, Teal, Tufted duck, Turnstone, Water rail, Whooper swan, Wigeon, Woodcock, Woodpigeon and Wren.
Please note that we take our recent sightings list from the visitor sightings board that anyone can contribute to. This is great as everyone can get involved, but obviously can lead to potential errors too as they aren’t always verified! We try to keep this list as accurate as possible but if you see something unusual feel free to comment here!
Photo credit: Fox by Rhiannon Munro
Photo credit: Pied wagtail by Aileen Wallen