Fresh look & Events 2017

With Spring around the corner, (that's proper Spring) it seemed like a good idea to "refresh" the information in the shelter.

 The entrance noticeboard will be "made over" next week.

With a bit of handiwork, and crafting the result is fresher, the photo's may not do it justice.

Simeon and I have completed the programme of guided events for April - September 2017 and I've detailed them below, I hope to see some of you on the events.

The last winter event is on Sunday 19th March at 10:00

April 11th, Carmarthenshire Wildlife Walks, Marsh, Beach & Dunes Joint walk 10:00am**

April 22nd, Beach walk and spring migration 10:00am**

May 20th, Ramble with a ranger 10:00am**

June 11th, Creepy crawlies and bug hunt  10:00am**

June 24th Summer flowers 10:00am**

July 6th Bat walk Sandy Water Park, meet at 9:15pm in the main car park, bring a torch. [please note this event is at Sandy Water Park]

July 15th,  Ramble with a ranger 10:00am**

August 26th Salt-marsh flowers 10:00am **

August 31st Bumblebee walk with Bumblebee Conservation Trust

this walk starts at 2pm

September 9th Creepy crawlies and bug hunt 10:00am**

September 23rd, Sea watch autumn migration 8:00am**

**Events start from the reserve entrance near the car park at CE53, the events are approximately 2 - 3 hrs duration, for details call 07984788218

Wind in the willows, what happened to Peter Rabbit Thursday 2nd March 2017

I spent a few hours at the Morfa Berwig LNR this morning, with blue skies and sunshine, and a bit of a breeze.

The flower buds on this Willow were just pushing out and blowing in the breeze

After the recent rains the site is wetter than usual, with all of the ponds looking in great condition.

With a couple of conservation grazing ponies on site I enjoyed checking out the ponds, disappointingly though no sign of any frog or toad activity.

There were a good variety of birds around with 17 species seen or heard, the best of which were Kingfisher, Water Rail and Cettis Warbler.

European Kingfisher

Signs of mammal activity were confined to a Short-tailed Field Vole under one of the refugia, and signs of a Rabbit nest having been dug out and the occupant eaten.

More interestingly was it eaten by a Fox or an Otter?

Rabbit nest dug out by a predator

Mixed day Wednesday 1st March 2017

With a 9.0m tide at around 08:00hrs there was only one place to be this morning, stood on top of a sand dune looking out onto Carmarthen Bay.

After a stormy day yesterday, this morning was much calmer and despite there not being a huge movement of birds, Three Red-throated Diver a few hundred Common Scoter and flocks of Golden Plover, Dunlin, Sanderling and Ringed Plover made for a decent sea watch.

A quick dash around to the information shelter with the marsh in full flood gave up Teal c50, Wigeon c10, Mallard c15, Shelduck 13 Curlew c6 plus Snipe, Redshank and distant Oystercatchers and a lone male Pintail.

Idyllic

Then it was off to do a radio interview for BBC Radio Wales, on the Strandline Beetle, and clean beaches. The broadcast was only about 30 seconds long and they edited out the important bit about leaving driftwood on the beach, but they did emphasise the importance of leaving large pieces of plastic/old tyres on the beach as habitat for the beetle.

Then I met up with the Wednesday gang and started the final phase of Dormouse Box construction.....

Dormouse box Production line and finished ? box

Saving the beetle part 2 Friday 24th February 2017

Well Storm Doris has left us relatively unscathed, there has been no damage caused on the reserve, in fact she has done some good with a lot of drift wood now exposed on the beach as well as a few new inundations of sand into the embryo dunes, all making more habitat available to The Strandline Beetle when they emerge from hibernation.

Top, a new area of sand blow inundation

Below,  a lot of drift wood has appeared after the storm

As well as relying on nature I have posted the Welsh Governments advice notice regarding the beetle and driftwood on our beaches; it's worth remembering of course that Cefn Sidan Beach has the full protection as a Site of Special Scientific Interest.

We can but try!

With a huge improvement in the weather today I saw or rather heard my first queen Bumblebee, (she flew into the side window of the van). It was probably a White-tailed Bumblebee Bombus  lucorum, (thanks Barry)

First Bumblebee of the year, The White-tailed Bumblebee.

Saving the "beetle" Wednesday 22nd February 2017

What a better way to spend my birthday than being out in the damp drizzle that was Pembrey Burrows LNR.

Wednesday = volunteer day, the day when our little team meet to spend the day being useful, doing all those conservation management jobs that just would probably not get done, most days I am on my own so having other like-minded folk to talk too makes a change, cattle are not great conversationalists!!!!!

My previous posts have highlighted the plight of "The Strandline Beetle", today we made great progress in the mitigation plan to attempt to slow their decline.

The idea is to place 1m long logs with chainsaw cuts made along the length to provide a safe cwtch for the beetle to hide in.

First cut down your tree and cut it to length

Gather your logs

Cut the cwtch

The finished logs, waiting to be positioned in the spring

Its too soon to put the logs on the beach/embryo dunes but when we do I'll post an update.

Fences and the one footed Oystercatcher Thursday 16th February 2017

Work has started on the completion of the fence around grazing field 1, the guys doing the work make it look so easy, well easier than when we have to keep repairing sections by hand.

The right tools make for light work!

The machine has switched from banging posts in to straining the wire! so much easier than the "by hand" method.... but eh we love it !!

I walked the eastern end of the reserve on what was a very spring like morning with Skylarks in song and a noticeable presence of Meadow Pipits and Linnets, there haven't been many birds around lately.

Another sign of spring is the presence of Common Shelduck, they really should be one of our breeding species but there was no evidence last season that they bred, maybe this year?

A good sized flock of Ringed Plover (76) and a huge flock of Oystercatchers, around 4250 including a rather poorly bird which had only one foot, it flew off ok but was decidedly lop-sided. A 1st winter Yellow Legged Gull was a good bird to find and "new" for the bird list.

Morfa Berwig, work day Wednesday 15th February 2017

Today the conservation ranger team was at Morfa Berwig LNR near Bynea.

This new LNR on a mix of brownfield and reclaimed wet meadow has great potential but it is a wet site.

Today we worked on a few different tasks, clearing fallen timber from one of the ponds, clearing access routes, installing new information panels and weather proofing the boundary signs opening up resting areas and building refugia.

The reserve has easy public access but decent footwear is useful, as winter fades into spring the area will provide good bird watching especially during the first few weeks of migration, later there will be good number of dragonflies, including Brachytron pratense the Hairy Dragonfly  last year Ischnura pumilio, the Small Blue-tail was found using the ephemeral pools.

Clearing small Willow from the track to a grazing field

Stone refugia, hopefully amphibians will find it useful

A south facing mound of rubble and decaying vegetation opened up as a basking site

While we were on the reserve one of the team, Neil, who happens to be the county mammal recorder, went off to do some monitoring.

Monitoring??