Red Listed

Posted on 13/04/2016 by Andy L

Turtle Dove Richard Tyler

This Saturday (16th April) sees the African Bird Club AGM at the Natural History Museum in London. There are half-a-dozen associated talks, and the event is open to members and non-members alike.

Of particular interest to us here in the Cotswolds is a talk on Turtle Doves in their wintering grounds in Senegal by Niki Williamson. Fewer and fewer of these birds visit the UK in summer. They are now scarcely seen in Gloucestershire and no longer breed in the county at all.

Curlew Richard Tyler

And closer to home, don’t forget our own AGM this Weds (13th April) at the Farmers Arms, Guiting Power at 7:30. Our guest speaker is Mike Smart, the county’s previous BTO rep, on ‘The Decline of the Curlew’ – very topical with members of the Society involved in the RSPB Curlew survey at the moment.

Painswick Falcons

Posted on 03/02/2016 by Andy L

Peregrine and young – Dave Pearce

The Painswick Bird Club is one of the smaller wildlife groups in Gloucestershire. Possibly they are squeezed for membership by the Cheltenham Bird Club to their north and Dursley Birdwatching and Preservation Society not far to the south. They have some interesting talks, though, and guests are welcome there at the Painswick Town Hall.

Last night Steve Watson of the Gloucestershire Raptor Monitoring Group and South West Peregrine Group gave a lively and intriguing talk on Peregrines. Steve is a long-standing (obsessive?!) Peregrine watcher with a fascination for their physiology: just how does this bird manage its high-speed stoops and the huge G-forces when it manoeuvres? How does it focus on its prey, near or far? And what weaponry has it evolved?

Steve’s observations centre on the RSPB site at Symonds Yat. This is a sheer cliff face in the Forest of Dean where you can see great views of the birds in flight, and Steve showed some video clips of this. To complement this, he invited Dave Pearce to say a few words about the Christ Church Peregrines at Cheltenham. The footage Dave has is more restricted but more detailed, with egg-laying and nest behaviour more in evidence that flight.

(The title for this piece became obvious once Steve mentioned that aPeregrine had been seen near Painswick church tower, which is just across the road from the Falcon Inn and the bowling club of that name!)

Indoor and Outdoor Meetings

Posted on 04/11/2015 by Andy L

New Bridge Lane

We have an outdoor meeting at Bourton-on-the-Water gravel pits this Sunday. The winter wildfowl are beginning to come in, and the Red Kite are increasing. Meet up at the Rissington Road lay-by at 9a.m. We’ll probably have a look at the marshland near New Bridge Lane as well (see photo). Likely to be muddy.

There are also a couple of good indoor meetings in the area (or in Gloucestershire at least). Most, I think, are a couple of pounds for non-members.

On Thurs 5th November Painswick Bird Club host a joint meeting with the Gloucestershire Naturalists Society at Painswick Town Hall (7:30). Jim Almond the wildlife photographer talks about Bird Reserves of the north Norfolk coast – a hot-spot if ever there was one.

On Fri 13th November Gloucestershire Naturalists Society’s speaker is Chris Sperring MBE (Hawk and Owl Trust) on British Owls, their natural history and conservation. This is at Watermoor church hall (no.4 on map), Cirencester at 7:30.

The next day members of Gloucestershire Wildlife Trust hold their AGM at the University of Gloucestershire (Park Campus) in Cheltenham. Adam Hart, Professor of Science Communication is the keynote speaker there.

We also have an indoor meeting at the Farmers Arms, Guiting Power on Fri 27th November for a skittles evening.

Barn Owls – Part 2

Posted on 28/09/2015 by Andy L

Barn Owls at six-and-a-half weeks

On last month’s expedition to ring a brood of Barn Owls we found another barn containing a nest-box that no-one had been aware of. Closer inspection revealed three newly-hatched chicks. As they were reckoned to be about one, three and five days old, they were too young to be ringed that day.

We came back nearly six weeks later and found an adult (which immediately slipped away) and two well-grown chicks. Don’t ask what had happened to the third…

A. ringing the elder one

D. retrieving the chicks in cotton bags

Weights…

…and measures

These chicks were slightly less advanced than the other brood when we ringed them – see how much down they still have compared to these.

M. who was supervising (Barn Owl ringing needs a Schedule 1 endorsement to the ringing permit) looked up the wing measurements in the tables, and pronounced the birds to be between 44 and 46 days old. This agrees very well the estimate of one to five days old when we first found the brood. It also suggests, unsurprisingly, that it was the youngest sibling that did not survive.

Barn Owls

Posted on 31/08/2015 by Andy L

Young Barn Owls Tom Beasley Suffolk

After 2014’s massive year for Barn Owl breeding, 2015 has been miserable. M reckons he has inspected 40 boxes in the whole county this year and ringed one single chick!

A retrieving the chicks

Better news, though. A box near Sherborne contained a very young chick and three eggs at the beginning of July.

Several weeks later there were three well-grown young, just past the ‘ugly’ stage and shedding their juvenile down whenever they moved.

Measuring to estimate the age

All three were ringed and measured. Incredibly (to me at least) you can age the chicks pretty accurately by measuring the seventh primary feather’s length and looking it up in guru Colin Shawyer‘s tables.

M weighing a chick in the bag

Weighing was also a surprise – the older the chick, the lighter they are.
They reach their maximum weight in the nest and slim down to flying
weight as they develop.

Raptor Identification

Posted on 11/06/2015 by Andy L

Hen Harrier – Richard Tyler

Gloucestershire Raptor Monitoring Group is holding a Raptor Id Day on common British birds of prey on Sat 20th June.

It takes place at the International Centre for Birds of Prey, Newent and will include not just info but a chance to see various species flying and close up.

The day costs £15 and numbers are limited, although there are a few places left at time of writing. Booking is via the Glos Raptors online shop.

Dawn Chorus

Posted on 31/03/2015 by Andy L

Wren photo: Richard Tyler

There are several walks Dawn Chorus walks coming up around the Cotswolds soon.

On Sat 25th April, Arthur Ball leads a group round Batsford Arboretum (near Moreton-in-Marsh). It starts at 4a.m and finishes up in the cafe. Price £12, details here.

The next Saturday (2nd May) the Cotswold Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty have a more relaxed start time of 7a.m. Andy Lewis leads the ‘Birds and Breakfast’ walk from their offices at the Old Prison, Northleach, with a full English breakfast at their Cotswold Lion Cafe included in the £9.

The National Trust gardens at Hidcote Manor (near Chipping Campden) have a walk starting at 5am on Sun 3rd May led by Andy Warren, with breakfast afterwards for £10.

Also on Sun 3rd May the Gloucestershire Wildlife Trust are running one starting at 4:30a.m at Whelford Pools in the Cotswold Water Park near Lechlade, price £5, and others at their headquarters at Robinswood Hill in Gloucester and their Lower Woods reserve in South Gloucestershire.

Set your alarm clocks!

New Groups

Posted on 22/01/2015 by Andy L

Barn Owl – Rob Brookes, from ‘Birds of the Cotswolds’ (Liverpool University Press 2009)

Two new bird study groups have been set up within the county recently. The first is the Gloucestershire Barn Owl Monitoring Programme, which seeks to provide advice and support for Barn Owl conservation. This project will liaise primarily with landowners and farmers, as Barn Owls have become so dependent on nest-boxes and the land on which they are sited. Sightings are crucial, though – if you don’t know where the owls are, you can’t put up nest-boxes or ring the birds.

The other group is the Gloucestershire Raptor Monitoring Group. This group will study a mixture of raptor species (suggestions welcome) and may also include Ravens, whose lifestyle and survey methods have similarities with raptors, and other owls. These species are far less popular with landowners – for understandable reasons – and the emphasis will be on birders logging sightings, breeding activity and behaviour.

The Gloucestershire Raptor Monitoring Group held its first meeting last Saturday at St Peter’s High School, Gloucester (a big thank-you for providing the facilities for free!). There were over 50 people there of all levels of skill and experience, but united in enthusiasm. The species picked out for further study at the moment are: Peregrine, helped by a very entertaining account of those at Symonds Yat by Steve Watson; Kestrel, whose numbers here have perked up this summer (but for how long?); Red Kite, which have now bred in the county for the first time in 150 years; and Goshawk, a fair number of which have been ringed due to Rob Husbands’ climbing ability and Schedule 1 licence.

Pics: Mervyn Greening

A Bill Guided by an Eye

Posted on 04/11/2014 by Andy L

Oystercatcher and young – Richard Tyler

A fascinating talk at the Cheltenham Bird Club by Graham Martin, whose speciality is bird vision. Having given us the elegant idea that “a bird is a wing guided by an eye“, he then proceeded to argue against it.

He suggested that the evolution of birds’ eyes is not driven by the long-distance vision required by flying, but by the requirements of close-up work, specifically that of feeding. If you can’t fly accurately, you can usually get away with a clumsy landing; but if you can’t peck accurately or grab from your parent’s bill, you starve quite rapidly. The vast array of different bill-shapes is complemented by a wide variation in birds’ visual capability (although this is much less obvious) which allows each species to use its particular bill to good effect.

Graham’s work on birds’ eyes and blind spots has practical implications for collisions with man-made structures like pylons and wind turbines. Some birds have evolved to scan the ground while flying, and so their blind spots – the top of the head and the back of the neck – face the way they’re moving. This can be dangerous today, but then there hasn’t often been anything in their line of flight until the last fifty years.

Upper Thames Waders

Posted on 18/10/2014 by Andy L

Snipe – Richard Tyler

To Banbury (in driving rain) for a meeting with the neighbours – the Banbury Ornithological Society, on whose pattern NCOS was formed nearly 30 years ago.

The occasion was a talk by Charlotte Kinnear from the RSPB’s Otmoor reserve – great place for an office! – on ‘Upper Thames Waders’, part of their Futurescapes project. This project has been running for several years, and looks at the fortunes of four wader species in areas of wet meadows in central England. The area includes the Thames near Lechlade, parts of the Windrush, Evenlode, Glyme, Thame and Cherwell valleys, and Otmoor itself.

In the far west of the study area we have a couple of Society members contributing data from the water-meadows on the Sherborne National Trust estate, notably on Lapwing, which bred well there this year and contributed to a small rise in their overall numbers.

Snipe, it appears, are seen everywhere but are only found breeding at Otmoor. Curlew are drifting gently down in number, and Redshank had a good year after several undistinguished ones. Mostly the species under scrutiny had a lousy year in 2013 because of the wet spring.

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Writing about NCOS, Cotswold birds and conservation

Author Archives: Andy L