Rye Meads Sightings Blog - March

March on the Reserve

Spring has definitely sprung, although my final memories of March are of going through three sets of clothes putting all of our Easter activities out in the rain and mud…

Regardless, we’re calling is Spring – blackthorn is in blossom, there’s daffodils around, and we’ve had our first butterflies of the year (Peacock and Brimstone). Before we get to the birds, we’ve also had a stoat make an appearance, and also some frogspawn in the ditch – a surprisingly rare occurrence for Rye Meads!

Habitat management has finished for the year, and we’re also in a race to finish otter-proofing the Tern rafts and get those out on the lagoons. At Draper, we now have a scrape with the water level much lower, and are already seeing the benefits of last year’s scrub clearance and the raised water level killing off remnant vegetation, with the left hand side in particular providing perfect spots for arriving waders.

On to the birdlife, in March we’ve added another 8 to our total for 2023, up to 86 species for the year. 18 of those sightings haven’t been photographed yet – for anyone reading this, your challenge for April is a Starling and a Pied Wagtail!

Brief visits from a Mediterranean Gull and a Great Crested Grebe have been verified as well as some Greylag Geese, flyovers from a Goshawk and some Sand Martins. Ones we did get photos of though: a record shot of a Great White Egret on the 4^th (over the meadow, but viewed from our turf so it counts!), a Linnet, and the arrival of some Little Ringed Plovers which are still punching above their weight on the Draper scrape as you’d expect.

Barn Owls

The pair of barn owls are still with us! Over the course of the month there were a few early sightings the day after a rainy night, particularly when we were a little slow to close the reserve at 5pm sharp… We were also able to run two after-hours sessions before the clocks went forward where most of our photos come from. We’ve had a lot of questions about whether or not we have any other after-hours events. The ones we ran were timed so that they were after a spell of rain, to maximise the chances of hunting during the day, which is why they tend to be last minute – and we also have the fact it means one of our two full-time members of staff having an evening spare to contend with! So, nothing in the plan but keep an eye on our website and social media, and also cross your fingers for breeding!

Lesser Spotted Woodpecker and Bearded Tits

Things have been fairly quiet for both the Lesser Spotted Woodpecker and the Bearded Tits over the last 6 weeks, but both were seen and photographed briefly. The Lesser Spot dropped in on the 11^th March and was seen by a few visitors and volunteers near the Ashby hide, while members of the Rye Meads Ringing Group also heard it calling close to Rye House train station. Bearded Tits were seen in the reedbed at Draper on 1^st March and heard past the Ashby Hide a few days later.

Kingfishers

We are of course into Kingfisher season, and a pair at the Kingfisher Hub has been investigating and clearing holes in the bank since February. Signs of courtship have been ongoing since mid-March with a lot of fish passing, although the jury is out on actual mating. It does seem like they’re a bit behind schedule compared to last year’s pair but for those visiting the Hub, if you can log anything useful in the book on the shelf that’s in there, very much appreciated.

Flamingos

Not really. But something that did cause a stir was one or two Black-Headed Gulls with a strong pink tinge to them. This is a fairly loose explanation but the first thing to say is that this is quite natural. The simple answer is that like flamingos, the gulls have gone a bit pink because of what they’ve eaten.

For those that want my vague interpretation of biological science…

Birds maintain their feathers through preening, and the majority of birds have a preen gland (or uropygial gland) which secrets preen oil, and many birds increase their preening as they approach the breeding season. The diet of many birds (including flamingos and black headed gulls) contains plants, algae and invertebrates that contain yellow, orange or red pigments called carotenoids. These carotenoids find their way into the preen oil of a bird. So, a bird with a heavy diet of red carotenoid-rich food will have preen oil with a pink tinge, and with a lot of preening will essentially dye itself pink, particularly noticeable if its feathers are naturally white. Flamingos are an extreme example of this, and with the right sort of diet you can see it in gulls too, like this one.

Photo Firsts

Alongside the photos of new arrivals, this is also the first time this year I’ve seen photos of four other species on the Friends of RSPB Rye Meads group. Despite sightings from January onwards, this is the first time someone has managed to catch a Sparrowhawk, as well as a deliberate photo of Common Gulls (there may be some hidden among the Black Headed Gull photos from previous months!). To my shame I did incorrectly identify one of them as a Herring Gull – slap on the wrist for that. This might also be the first photo of a Wood Pigeon, which is often ignored, including by me assuming that its mostly Feral Pigeons around. Finally, although we had a handful of Blackcaps in early January, the summer migrants are arriving and so they are being seen a bit more regularly now.

The Rest

Just a bit of a photo dump for everything else. Personal highlights are a Kestrel popping up at the nest box by the Kingfisher Hub which was used last year, as well as Stonechat, Treecreeper, Water Rail, Oystercatchers, and a LOT of Chiffchaffs