SNOW days 2nd March 2018

Well the snow set in here around 3pm, as forecast really fine dry stuff.
It's amazing how quickly the wildlife seems to have been affected by this cold snap, it's been building up for a few day with easterly winds however the snow made an immediate impact with quite big cold weather movements observed, and especially this morning.

I went to check the cattle, (well that was my excuse) which were all fine, but the numbers of REDWING, FIELDFARE, BLACKBIRD, SONG THRUSH, LAPWING and GOLDEN PLOVER on the reserve was interesting.

Probably 500-1000 Redwing, 50+ Fieldfare small flocks of Blackbirds and Song Thrush,  with around 100 each of Lapwing and Golden Plover.

Hopefully a thaw will set in soon which will give the birds time to recover.

St Davids Day 1st March 2018

I don't hold with the "meteorological" spring starting today, for me it's still winter and judging by the weather I'm not wrong.

At Morfa Berwig all of the water courses are frozen over and the ground is like steel, great for the contractors on site carrying out Water Vole habitat management and some ditch clearance.

Along the Afon Goch, over shadowing Willows coppiced

The ditch along the A484 boundary

I filled the feeders with plenty of birds hanging around, I'll try and get there tomorrow to fill them up again.

It was off to Pembrey to check the condition of the ponds, which are the only source of drinking water for our conservation grazing cattle. With the stiff wind both ponds have open water, although one pond is frozen enough to walk on the ice, I know because I tried. The cattle are hardy breeds and looked fine this morning. The "swan Drain" has piles of ice on the banks

Field 2 pond now only a small area of open water, but the cattle can still drink

There were small groups of Lapwing hunkered down in the dunes, with the ground frozen ( it was -2'c at 11am ) they will struggle unless they move further afield.

Knobbling Wednesday 28th february 2018

Brrrrrr..., a bit nippy even when you dress for it .

However being the hardy souls that we are on a Wednesday we set out to fix yet another part of the fence in GF3, carefully watched by the five boys, 406 is the brave one quite nosey really.


After banging in four new posts we set off to check another length of fence, apart from a few staples needed it was secure enough.

A couple of Golden Plover flew in low and landed on the marsh, an unusual sight for us, they usually fly straight through, some Lapwings and a few flocks of Skylarks hinted at a cold weather movement.

We left Pembrey for the Millennium Coastal Park, more specifically the PWLL Lagoon LNR where we put in a new boundary sign, in "easy" digging it was soon in, and looking good.

Easy digging

Is it deep enough?

It is level!!!!!!!

Well I did dig most of the LH hole

Busy Tuesday 27th February 2018

Contractors, working on behalf of Natural Resources Wales, are on site at Morfa Berwig carrying out some ditch and Willow clearance, so needed to be let in this morning, I also topped up the feeders before "the blizzard" arrives on Thursday, and.....checked the camera trap that I put out yesterday evening.

BINGO, check the bottom right hand side of the video for a very brief view of an OTTER, the river froze yesterday and it looks like the Otter came along the bank not through the water as anticipated but you know what I DON'T CARE, I got an Otter on film, now starts an opportunity.

After that morale boost it was off to a Carmarthenshire Nature Partnership meeting at WWT Llanelli, an interesting networking opportunity as always. I made copies of the guided events available which were well received.

After lunch some of the meeting debunked to Morfa Berwig for a walk around, some of the group hadn't visited before and those that had were impressed with the management works which have been carried out during the last few months.

A good representation from various public and NGO's at the meeting

here are the hardy ones who came for a walk

L_R, Coed Cymru, CCC Planning Conservation x3, ARC, WWTx2

I took the opportunity to photograph one of the very early tiny bright red flowers of Hazel, usually overlooked as it is so small this, the female flower, is very intricate.

Monday 26th February 2018

This month is nearly over,  know it's a shorter but still its flown by.

This morning, in a stiff easterly I joined the great team from mencap Cymru to install a sign recognising the important and ,much appreciated , work that they do along the coast here in the Pembrey and Llanelli area, carrying out a huge amount of litter picking and helping with other tasks such as fencing and putting in signs.

A few of the mencap volunteers said,

"I hope people read the sign and don't drop litter..."

I checked the cattle, which are looking good, being mostly Welsh Blacks and a few Hereford crosses they are all very hardy and are not phased by the colder weather, with plenty to eat and their drinking ponds full and not frozen (it's too windy) they all seemed quite content.

Well the forecast "beast from the east" is beginning to make it's presence felt what will the rest of the week bring.............

Magpie diaries, Sunday 25th February 2018

What a fantastic if chilly day, a brisk walk around Pembrey reserve this morning in glorious sunshine.

Nine Lapwings flying east were new for 2018, not much else going on apart from the Orienteering event where 100's of brightly and bizarrely clothed individuals were determinedly running in all directions through both the country park and the reserve, I used to do orienteering myself when I was younger and fitter.....I know hard to believe but true.

I spotted a few random twigs in a Poplar tree at the bottom of a neighbours garden yesterday and a Carrion Crow lurking nearby, last year they nested in a Cherry tree in another garden. Today I found the actual birds responsible for the construction, a pair of Magpies, they seem optimistic, I'm going to try and document the building of the nest and share the videos on the blog.

In the meantime a few facts about the Magpie, Pica pica, a member of the Corvid family some of the cleverest birds on earth.

An opportunistic omnivore they don't have many "friends" whether human or animal. They will feed on almost anything including nestlings and small birds, these are sometimes caught in flight. The birds at Pembrey have a taste for the caterpillars of The Fox Moth a hairy beast and the birds can be seen bashing them on the ground presumably to remove some of the hairs.

A bonded pair will remain together through the year, although like some humans, the males do have an eye for the ladies and can be promiscuous.

The nest is loosely constructed and usually dome shaped the cup is lined with mud lined with grass, hair, leaves and other soft material; a clutch of eggs is typically comprised of between 5-7 eggs, more rarely 3-10!

Here's the first short video of construction, hopefully more to follow.

RINGING at last Saturday 24th February

This morning was the first time since November that I have had the opportunity to ring at one of my own sites.

I visited Morfa Berwig with Edward one of the Gower Ringing Group trainees and set just two 40' nets around the feeder site.

Given the number of Blue and Great Tits in the area it was no surprise that they dominated the catch, however quality soon arrived in the shape of a WILLOW TIT, already ringed and re encountered once before this is the juvenile bird hatched at WWT, its fair to say we were happy with trapping the bird which was in great condition.

Willow Tit

A couple of rounds later we were pleased to see a "thrush" in the net, as I went to extract it there rather surprisingly was a REDWING, although not carrying any fat it felt in reasonable condition.

Redwing

The next round brought smiles as a Greater Spotted Woodpecker was in one net, then to top it Edward shouted that there was a "big bird" in the other net, in fact there were 2 JAYS in the net.
Oh what fun, Jays are vicious birds to handle with a deceptively hooked tip to the bill and it hurts, I don't care what any other ringers may be thinking, it hurts!, they were found to both be adult birds.

A great morning with the following captures. BLUE TIT 17, GREAT TIT 15, COAL TIT 3, DUNNOCK 3, JAY 2, CHAFFINCH 1. REDWING 1, ROBIN 1, GS WOODPECKER 1, WILLOW TIT 1,

Jay