Since the media seems to be obsessed with naming babies at the moment, I'm wondering whether we can get the same enthusiasm for naming our first brood of lapwing chicks for the year...
Volunteer Phil reports on the highlights from a day at Pulborough Brooks on Friday.
For the past few weeks visitors to West Mead Hide have been able to observe a lapwing nesting on one of the islands in the pool with eggs being mostly incubated by the female but with occasional relief from the male. Its good to be able to report that this nest has now produced 3 chicks giving very different views.
Unlike many other birds just hatched the lapwing chicks are up and about already, trotting around and feeding themselves and allowing the parents to concentrate on keeping a lookout for predators. Somehow the female had managed to coax her chicks first to a smaller island between the nest island and the bank of the pool and then onto the bank itself where there is plenty of cover in the grass and the rushes. This must have been a fascinating sight for anyone who happened to be in the hide at the time but I arrived too late. However all the birds were visible for much of the day from the hide, and as well as normal feeding the female was sometimes to be seen brooding her chicks.
West Mead pool also produced the other particularly notable sighting of the day when a little ringed plover (a frequent sight in the last few weeks) and a ringed plover were to be seen side by side for a short time allowing for a comparison of size and plumage. The little ringed plover has an orange eye ring with pale legs and a black bill. The ringed plover has no eye ring but an orange bill with black tip and orange legs. The latter is more of a coastal bird than its smaller cousin, but does occur inland on passage and occasionally breeds near sand and gravel pits.
Finally amongst much other birdsong, notably various types of warbler, the nightingales are still singing well and visitors to the evening Nightingale Festival walk were treated to the full range of this bird’s astonishing repertoire.