Thank you to Phil for his latest report and photos....
Recent Sightings 13 and 17 February – More about Canada Geese
Anyone reading my article from last week will recall my speculation about the geese posting a lookout while the others are feeding. Following last Monday’s early morning WeBS count I was having a relaxing break at West Mead when a group of about 30 Canada Geese landed on the pool and I observed some more interesting and even entertaining behaviour.
First I noticed one goose making a rather curious gesture with its neck outstretched, beak wide open and tongue clearly visible.
Then all manner of strange behaviour started which eventually I could only interpret at the time as the geese simply having a fun trip to their “swimming bath”. In this photo one goose seems to have turned turtle as you can see a webbed foot in the air and another goose is very noticeably ruffling its feathers
Other geese would submerge themselves completely but I don’t believe they were feeding like diving ducks. In this photo the splashing water marks the presence of an underwater goose.
Returning on Friday for my normal Hides and Trails duty I and several visitors witnessed an identical performance from the Canada geese at West Mead. The consensus amongst the many visitors who saw it was that it was some sort of curious mass courtship display, however my research suggests that Canada geese are monogamous and displaying usually takes place between 2 birds. This photo, taken almost exactly 2 years ago at West Mead, is probably an example and I haven’t as yet been able to find any information that would explain the recent behaviour.
There has been a lot of peregrine activity at West Mead in recent weeks so it wasn’t surprising to see one there on Monday spooking the wigeon. This allowed me to photograph them in flight from several different angles where they appeared to be quite different depending on whether they caught the sun or not. This photo shows the wigeon in the air close to the hide flying away with the sun catching their very white rear underparts.
By contrast a second photo shows their darker upper side as they are wheeling and the white wing bar is visible in some of the birds.
The wigeon provided quite a spectacle but for sheer numbers of birds it was impossible to beat the huge number of aerial lapwings perhaps disturbed by a peregrine on the North Brooks.
Another sighting of particular interest was a lesser spotted woodpecker reported on Monday by a number of visitors on the oak trees near the hairpin bend in the path going down to Nettley’s Hide. I waited there with several others for quite a long time to see it without success. A great spotted woodpecker appeared causing some brief excitement before it became evident it was too big for our target bird. I’ve seen these birds many times in all parts of the reserve in recent weeks.
A water vole was seen once again from the hide on both Monday and Friday giving now at least 3 sightings in a week.
I read with interest my colleague Gary’s report from Tuesday about raptors at Winpenny. Friday was also very good for raptors here. The short eared owl he reported did not appear but peregrine and marsh harrier were both seen. The highlight however was the scrap over some unidentified kill on the riverbank nearby. This proved that 3 buzzards will beat 2 red kites. This photo shows one of the kites perched near a rather obscured buzzard, which appears to be smaller, and is enjoying a meal.
The kites eventually had to give up and this photo shows them circling before flying away disappointed.
In a sign of spring an adder gave excellent views to some people lucky enough to be in Adder Alley at the time. Adders had been observed there on Thursday too so were obviously responding to the mild weather and sunshine.
Song thrushes were also responding to the weather and very vocal and I heard dunnocks singing several times on both days.
To mark the end of a mostly fine week, and with the broken cloud giving way to clear skies, I had a short walk on the heathland to see the beautiful evening sky over the South Downs.