Looking Their Best for Spring

When I arrived on Thursday the sun was already bright and all the birds seemed to be concentrating on looking good. Opening the Tern hide the pair of little ringed plovers were both preening away. The female in the top picture has much blacker ear coverts than the male, they also often have rather weak breast bands, although this bird is actually quite well marked. Both pictures show the importance of flexibility in the quest to reach those hard to get at places. Obviously keeping the feathers in tip top condition is vital, they are all that stand between a bird and the elements and at each set has to last, body feathers are usually moulted twice a year and wing and tail feathers once. Then, of course, it is important to look good if you are to get a mate.

At the Centre I was putting on my boots when I heard the calls of a lesser spotted woodpecker, looking round I found it in the dead branch of the oak beside the car park, it was the female, as well as calling she was also drumming. I did not expect to be able to get a picture, it takes a while to set up to digi-scope, but I was in luck.

In fact she stayed on the branch for two or three minutes, the reason being that she too was brushing up her act and just like the plover the neck feathers seemed to be the toughest to get at.

The volunteers were in and we were preparing the tern rafts for launch, possibly next week or the week after. On the way down to Ivy Lake the flowering blackthorn was a great sight and very attractive to insects.

Later in the day I was again in the Tern hide and a pair of goosander were somewhat closer than usual, on the small island near the hide, they too had come ashore to smarten up their plumage in the sunshine.

Lesser Spotted at Last

Looking north from the Tern hide first thing, it was grey and cold in the brisk north east wind. The water pipit was once again near the hide briefly, before flying off eastwards. There were also a couple of drake goldeneye, diving near the hide, despite poor light I did get one lucky shot when one was briefly on the surface.
I spent a while during the morning clearing vegetation from the shore to the west of the Tern hide to make it more attractive to nesting lapwing. At that time it was still cloudy, but as I finished the sun came out and, although still with a cold wind it became very pleasant. In fact nice enough to have lunch outside at the tables behind the Centre. Despite the sun I did not see any nectaring insects today, although the lungwort flowers in the garden are now well out and are popular with bees and butterflies.

The lungwort is a garden plant, although there is a native species that is found in Hampshire. There are native plants in the garden as well and the most obvious at present is the primrose.

As we ate lunch the lesser spotted woodpecker flew in and started feeding on the trunk of a nearby alder tree. It was a male and no doubt the same that has been around for a few weeks now, presumably it has been checking out the area for potential nesting, let's hope it finds a mate. I was especially pleased as I had failed to see it until today. We also had a fly past by 4 raven, possibly part of the group of seven which had flown over earlier in the morning.

During the afternoon I spent a couple of hours toppling willows, mimicking wind-throw. The trees should remain alive and produce a low dense thicket rather than the tall leggy stemmed trees they had become. This technique produces a very thick tangle of branches and is only of use in areas where there is unlikely to be a need to enter. It retains all of the biomass and is obviously a lot quicker than coppicing. Elsewhere when we have done this on the reserve it has proved good for nesting warblers and thrushes.

I did not hear of many other sightings today, I did see the 2 smew on Ivy Lake, but do not know if the bittern or black-necked grebe were seen today. The Woodland hide had large numbers of brambling and good numbers of lesser redpoll and siskin at the feeders, there were also a couple of reed bunting there.

Tarin des aulnes

The ringers were in again this morning and had a pretty good session with fifty three birds caught including good numbers of lesser redpoll and siskin. One of the siskin was a control, which is to say a bird ringed somewhere else, however better than that it had been previously ringed in France, hence the title (it is French for siskin).

When I went to open the hides I had to clear the Woodland hide windows of condensation, a common problem at this time of year. However the windows are often also smeared and it is clear that a bird or bird has been beating their wings against the glass. I know the bird in question is a, or rather two carrion crows, as I have seen them doing it. I can understand that they might be doing it because they can see their reflections, however when the glass is covered in condensation this surely cannot be the case. Judge for yourself, the cleared areas are quite reflective but the misted areas certainly are not.
The moth trap caught quite well last night, both for moths as well as yet another minotaur beetle, this time a male with the "horns".

The moths included 3 spring usher, pale brindled beauty, dotted border, 2 chestnut and 4 March moth. Below are spring usher,

and a March moth.

It was another very fine day and of course a Thursday, so a return of form for the volunteers after last week's aberration. We finished the clearance of small willows for the Million Ponds Project pond creation. Later I continued with removing laurel bushes and thinning some of the planted trees west of Ellingham Pound. There is just a chance I can retrieve some of the hawthorns to make the basis of a hedge if I can get rid of the shading from the laurels.

There were a good few people about today and between them they reported all sorts of birds. The smew were on Ivy Lake but went fishing in the reeds so disappeared from view. There were 2 bittern seen from Ivy North hide and perhaps most remarkable of all the great grey shrike put in a brief appearance at the Woodland hide, not somewhere you would traditionally associate with this species. The 2 black-necked grebe were on Ibsley Water, again on the eastern side of the lake and an adult Mediterranean gull was also seen there. Finally Jim saw a male lesser spotted woodpecker in the trees just by the gate on the north side of Ellingham Drove on the path to the Tern hide, the fifth or sixth sighting in the last couple of months and the third in a fortnight.

Lastly I saw my first bumble-bee of the year today, rather later than usual, it was, as the first ones usually are, a Bombus terrestris and of course a queen.

Too Good to Burn

A day which started misty with ice on the ground cleared to pleasantly warm sunshine. The "Volunteer Thursday" magic had worked again. Once again today we were clearing scrubby willow from the old silt pond where we plan to make a series of small ponds for the Million Ponds Project and refurbishing the sand martin bank. When we clear trees and with the dense growth of scrubby willows and extensive areas of unmanaged landscape plantings we have to clear quiet a bit, we never burn up the brash. This is not laziness it is because dead wood is a valuable resource.
The reserve has very little dead wood habitat, not surprising as most of the woodland is very young, one of the few areas with a lot is in the alder carr south of the Centre where many trees have succumbed to phytophora disease. Dead trees harbour lots of life, the larvae of beetles are often eaters of wood and in turn get eaten by birds such as woodpeckers. Dead wood in water is favoured by lots of fly larvae and there are specialists that eat certain types of tree or diameter of branch.

The tops of cut trees provide lots of small diameter twigs and branches, as well as being food, these can be used to create dead hedges, providing low dense cover, used by nesting birds and as cover to avoid predators. They are also popular with reptiles and amphibians.

A dead hedge does not last long, the small branches breakdown in a couple of years or so, but in this time they can provide support for brambles to grow through and so make a more permanent habitat, especially popular with nesting birds. A bramble hedge also makes a great barrier and is cheaper, more effective and longer lasting than a fence.

I saw rather little today, using a chainsaw and spending too long in the office does not make for good wildlife sightings. That said I did see a bittern as I opened the Ivy North hide. The reserve was very busy though and lots of other people did see all sorts of wildlife. The great white egret was on Ivy Lake for much of the day and bittern was seen on and off all day, both the egret and bittern were seen catching fish, in both cases they looked like rudd or roach. Over on Rockford Lake at least one smew was seen and best of all a lesser spotted woodpecker was found by the volunteers as they walked along the Dockens Water path to the worksite for the morning task.