Monday 20 November 2017

Breeding season part 2

Apologies for delay of this post and thanks to everyone who has given me info, especially angus and Gareth for comments on part 1.
So to start with update on species covered in part 1;
Little Grebe, a juvenile at the racecourse may well have been raised there.
Sparrowhawk, almost as soon as had published part 1 young were heard and then seen at the northern end of the reserve.
Parakeet; a sudden upsurge in records with several double figure reports in early autumn suggests they bred locally.
Green woodpecker, great spotted woodpecker and nuthatch all successfully reared young.
Swift swallow and house martin were rare in the central part of the reserve and were sustained by crowther rd, the racecourse and farndale/racecourse respectively.
Warblers also had mixed fortunes the hilite being the successful breeding of reed warblers on the racecourse. But willow warbler and garden warbler seemingly failed to nest and common whitethroat were thin on the ground with the lupin field producing the only family parties of local nesters. Chiffchaff  and blackcap nested in good numbers but lesser whitethroat were probably restricted to passage birds.
Treecreeper; the only known nest failed due to predation (possibly due to the weasel seen in the paddocks) but were regular in newbridge wood and probably bred elsewhere.
All the common tits did ok with great being the most successful but a lack of the usual mixed flocks in late summer suggests it was not a good year.
Whereas thrushes especially song and blackbirds had a good year as did robins.
Grey wagtails were successful at the prefabs and on the racecourse raising at least 5 young but their pied cousins were very lacking apart from on the racecourse.
Linnet; two pairs on lupin field outcome unknown.
Goldfinches had another good year judging by the flock of 30 plus at the end of August at the wetland and both bullfinch and greenfinch bred on barleyfield successfully but chaffinch were scarce.

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