Brief Update

A fair bit of running about today meant that I did not have much of a chance to see any wildlife on the reserve. Following on from yesterday, when I was off site for almost the whole day looking at the management of another reserve, so I have to confess to having not a lot of idea what has been about.

Yesterday I saw two of the mandarin on Ivy Lake as I opened up, about 100 siskin in the alders near the Ivy silt pond were also a fine sight. Today out on Ibsley Water shore there was a wheatear, probably the last we will see this year and on the lake itself the goldeneye had increased to two birds, I think an immature drake and a duck.

One task I did do in the day was to check out the ponies on Mockbeggar Lake, when I had checked quickly the other day all I saw were fresh dropping so seeing some animals today was reassuring. I also saw at least 12 little egret with the grey heron on the islands in the lake, the most I have seen for a long time, although it would not have been at all remarkable a couple of years ago.

I was back at the reserve in the evening, in fact I am still there (here) now, so I had a chance to have a quick look at the gull roost on Ibsley Water. I estimated about 9000 large gulls, roughly 8000 lesser black-backed gull, 1000 herring gull and about 1400 black-headed gull. There were also 5 common gull and a few great black-backed gull. This last species has been up to the trick of attacking the smaller gulls to get them to disgorge their last meal. To do this they grab a bird by a wing in flight and shake it, unfortunately this often damages or breaks the wing and is why there are often a few wandering gulls each with a drooping wing wandering the shore of the lake in the daytime. In time most die, or are killed and end up being eaten by either fox or buzzard.

Volunteer task and bumper Common Gull count

Today was Thursday so it was volunteer day. Although the walk to the site uses up some of the time we had several jobs that needed doing around the Goosander hide area over beside Ibsley Water. We split the team up with some filling the new Sand Martin nesting pipes that will shortly go into the new section of wall, then cutting birch regrowth in the "Dozings" area just south fo the hide. Meanwhile the bulk of the team worked on laying over some tall willows beside the path to the Lapwing hide. These are a problem because they are prone to falling onto the path and they have grown so tall that their structure is no longer of great value to wildlife. The task involved cutting part the way through the stem and bending over the tree, when it works they stay growing and the fact that they are lain over one another keeps grazing deer away from the regrowth.
Above the work has just started, as well as laying over the smaller stems and thinning the standards to allow in more light. Below at the end of the session a low dense tangle that should go green with new growth in the spring diversifying the habitat in this area by introducing some low dense cover. It is also interesting to see just how much the remaining snow melted in the hour and a half between the pictures.

A quick look at some of the lakes today showed that ice cover is still considerable. On Ibsley Water about 50%, on Ivy Lake about 80% and similar on Rockford, slightly less on Blashford Lake at about 70%. The 6 Red-crested Pochard are still on Blashford Lake, bickering with the Coot over beakfuls of weed, there was also a single drake Ruddy Duck there.

At dusk on Ibsley Water the Tufted Duck count was a fair bit lower than last night at 204, however the Common Gull count was by far the highest I have ever recorded at 443.

Tomorrow we are doing a full count of all the lakes, so we will see what we find.