Birdwatching at Winnall Moors

This week the volunteers went birdwatching around the reserve at Winnall Moors. It was an amazing sunny day, especially after the snow of last week, with beautiful clear blue skies. On our walk we saw a Little Egret with its distinctive yellow feet, if you had seen one in Winchester 20 years ago it would have been an astonishing site that would have attracted “Twitchers”, people who travel the UK in search of rare birds. It is thought the Little Egret spread to the UK from continental Europe possibly as a result of climate change. Alas the egret was too quick for me to get a photo. We also saw the usual suspects at Winnall, such as Mallard Ducks, Moorhens, Coots, Blue, Great and Long Tailed Tits, Blackbird, Robin as well as some birds that are easy to miss such as the Little Grebe or Dabchick which searches for molluscs, invertebrates and small fish in the river.

Despite carefully scanning the river and listening out for their distinctive whistle we didn’t succeed in spotting a kingfisher. However, a few days previously I did spot a Kingfisher near to the artificial nest hole. I was optimistically looking at the branches near to the nest hole when I spotted a fragment of blue through the leaves of a cherry laurel. In the soft afternoon light it was hard to tell what the source of blue was, could it be litter, as is often the case along river banks in urban areas? Or was it light catching the shiny leaves of the laurel? I thought if I watch this mysterious piece of blue for a minute or so and it moved then I new I had a kingfisher. And move it certainly did, diving into the river then flying to a nearby perch with a fish in its bill, which it preceded to beat on the branch it had just landed on whilst orientating the fish head first into its mouth.

Stomach full the bird flew onto a stake I had placed outside the entrance hole for such purposes. My heart was in my mouth as I watched this brilliant flash of blue dart briefly in and out of the nest tunnel. After dirtying its plumage in the tunnel the bird did a shallow dive into the river shaking off the water and soil from its feathers as it took off.

It is still early in the season and this was just a lone male so this is no definite sign that Kingfishers will use the nest this year, but it is great to know that at least one kingfisher knows the nest box is there. Fingers crossed for the spring.

Kingfisher hunting for fish on Winnall Moors in January. Copyright Dave Eades.

A male kingfisher watching over the river. You can tell its an adult by the bright orange/red toes and that its a male by its lower mandible (lower jaw) is black, on a female this would be orange. Copyright Dave Eades.

Here’s the latest footage from the cameras at Winnall Moors including voles, Blackbirds as well as Otters:

 

 

 

 

 

Read Full Post »

Spring on its way?

During the week I took 10 minutes out of a busy day to walk around a little of Winnall Moors.  As it was a calm day the birds were in full song, already establishing their territories in readiness for breeding in spring. A Song Thrush has been singing its beautiful song since early January from the top of a poplar tree near the reserve entrance. Some plants are also showing signs that spring is  under way with daffodils and snowdrops in flower around Winchester.

You may think that being so close to the centre of busy Winchester Winnall Moors wouldn’t provide you with much wildlife to spot in early February, but you couldn’t be more wrong. In this brief walk I saw two Roe Deer, Moorhen, Mallard Ducks, a Sparrowhawk, a Water Vole and I also heard a Kingfisher whislting, a Water Rail calling and a Grey Squirrel barking. Just by walking slowly and keeping quiet I had a close encounter with a Goldcrest which was in a small flock of birds predominantly made up of Long Tailed Tits with a few Blue and Great Tits lurking in the twigs as well. Goldcrests are one of my favourites and are Britain’s smallest bird (equally as small is their relation the Firecrest). At 9cm in length and weighing 6 grams they are nearly half the weight of a Wren. The male birds have a bright orange flash of feathers in the middle of the goldcrest on their heads. 

A male Goldcrest looking a little disgruntled after having a bird ring placed on his leg.

Small birds such as Tits and Goldcrests tend to form multi species assemblages as many eyes looking out for danger is better than one or two. One such predator that these birds are on the look out for is a Sparrowhawk. Long Tailed Tits are another bird that brings a dash of colour to a winters day, not only do they have pink plumage but if you get close and look at their eyes through a pair of binoculars you will see that their eye lids are a bright orange colour!

The encounter I had with the Water Vole was probably the best I have ever had. He sat nibbling on some water parsnip not more than 6 feet away from me. I was also able to show the vole to 4 passers by, by raising a finger to my lips to tell them to be quiet they crept closer and together we were able to watch the vole feeding for several minutes before it plopped into the water and swam across the channel before disappearing behind a willow tree.

Near to the entrance of the reserve are many, many otter spraints. This coincides with a higher level of activity recorded on the camera system and otters across the UK have been found to leaves spraints at much higher numbers during January and February. It is thought that this is due fish stocks being at there lowest during late winter/early spring and that an otter within its territory is telling other otters that this patch of river is already being fished so you best find another piece of river to catch food on. This is known as resource partitioning and may reduce the incidence of fighting between otters as they already know who is in the area and who they need to avoid. Otters will also be able to identify individuals from spraints, what sex the otter is and if they are ready to breed. However, we may never know all the reasons for otters marking their territory and what messages are contained in their spraints.

An otter leaves the river to mark its territory.

Otter inside old tree root.

Below are the links to the latest otter footage where you can see an otter make the seamless transition from water to land:

Read Full Post »