Northern Experience Wildlife Tours

No, not a post about the culinary delight I conjoured up yesterday for Sarah (butternut squash stuffed with bacon, blue cheese, garlic, creme fraiche and honey) although that was a bit of a milestone in my domestication

No, it’s a post about an unexpected bounty that our garden birds are reaping currently.  I usually try to fill all of our bird feeders just as it’s getting dark, that way the birds don’t get disturbed (not that it seems to bother some of them – Coal Tits will often just move to slightly higher branches in the apple tree, Robins seem to have no problem sitting just a few feet away).  Inevitably some seed gets spilled.  There’s also a reasonable amount of seed on the ground because the Coal Tits will sit on the feeders and discard anything they don’t fancy at the time.  With several days of snowfall over the last few weeks this was creating something that I hadn’t realised; layers of food sandwiched between each successive snowfall.  Now that the thaw is well under way, although there is still plenty of snow down here on the low ground, these layers of chilled bird seed are being exposed.  30 Chaffinches have been under the tree for most of today, and 8 Greenfinches have been around as well.   After a complete absence of sightings in recent weeks, a Great Spotted Woodpecker has returned to the garden.  At least one Brambling is still making sporadic appearances and the Blue, Coal and Great Tits are almost too numerous to count.  As we’re feeding in parts of Choppington Woods, and some of our neighbours have well-stocked bird feeders we might expect numbers to decrease but we’ve got more birds now than in the depths of the snow and ice last week.  Time to refill the feeders and dream of a rare thrush, bunting or accentor

As we drove past Cresswell, Sarah spotted a family of Whooper Swans in a roadside field.  As they seemed fairly settled, Sarah decided to capture an image of them in the snow.  Luckliy we did this there and then, as there was no sign of them when we passed by there an hour later.

Whooper Swans near Bell's Farm

Checking all of the unfrozen water that we could find in southeast Northumberland did eventually produce a brief sighting of an Otter.

Druridge Pools was remarkably photogenic; a handy dog-walker added to the photo opportunities and Teasels are really attractive covered in snow or frost.  There was a noticeable movement of Skylarks along the coast as well; 200+ as we walked from the Oddie Hide back to the car.

Druridge in the snow

More attractive than when they're in flower?

Once we were back at home, Sarah was watching the comings and goings at the feeding station when she called through to the living room “Brambling!”.  I ran to the window just in time to see it fly over our neighbour’s garden and out of sight.  I set the camera up ready and eventually it appeared at the end of our garden with a flock of Chaffinches.  Then it vanished again…and appeared in our neighbour’s garden.  Another disappearing act and, after what seemed like an eternity, it flew in from the churchyard on the opposite side of our house.  That wasn’t the end of the story though, as it hid in the thickest tangles of our apple tree for over an hour before offering up a reasonable shot.

A cracking winter garden visitor

Now I’m back at the desk in my office, collating survey data, preparing newsletters and catching up on e-mails…but I can still see the birds at our feeding station, and a rather optimistic Sparrowhawk displaying over Choppington Woods.  A New Year but some old friends; Birdwatching, Northumberland and a dSLR.

The world around us was cloaked in white as we walked home from The Swan early this morning.  A Tawny Owl was calling from the woods, but there was little other sound – muffled as it was by the snow.  By the time we woke up, there was a lot more snow than there had been when we finally fell into bed.  To shake off the lingering after-effects of Old Year’s Night we decided to take a walk around Choppington Woods, wrapped up warm and armed with a camera.  Photography, rather than birdwatching was our main aim, and that was fortunate as there were a lot more birds in our garden than we encountered on the walk; Great, Blue, Coal and Willow Tits, Greenfinch, Chaffinch and Bullfinch, Robin, Wren, Dunnock and Blackbird were around the feeders and, bird of the day, a Common Buzzard flying north over our allotment.  Snow can make a relatively mundane landscape into a photogenic delight, but exposure calculations can be tricky and we spent a lot of time checking compositions and looking for obvious ‘lead-in’ lines.  As we made our way back towards home 350 Pink-footed Geese flew south overhead.  Moving ahead of more wintry weather maybe?

The view from our patio 01/01/2010

Willowburn Pasture and a frozen flood

Following in a Moorhen's footsteps

Choppington Woods pond from the new boardwalk

Sarah scanning the trees

Footpath and fence along the Willow Water

I must have driven the A69 between Throckley and Haydon Bridge over 1000 times.  Working at that corner of the county for three years meant that I had the return journey at all times of year and in all weather conditions.  It also meant that I could check out birdwatching sites along the route (at least whenever I set off early enough in a morning…or extended the journey home).

Today we drove that familiar route, traversing the county from east to west, with the snow-covered North Pennine hills away to the south, past Little Owl sites near Ponteland, a couple of fields with Roe Deer (where I first saw them in 2001), several Common Buzzard territories and a Peregrine territory, where there were two birds today – scattering Jackdaws and Lapwings as they went.  Astonishing sight of the day was a Fulmar making it’s way E along the valley!  I’ve seen them inland before (even our garden has 2 records – and a Fulmar shearing along the allotments is a pretty bizarre sight) but this was almost as far from the sea as you can get in the Northeast.  Lapwings were dotted around the snow-covered fields, Fieldfares and Redwings were in the roadside hedges and Kestrels were hovering intently over the verge.

Eventually we arrived at our destination, Poltross Wild Bird Foods, where we caught up with Martin and Jose and had a chat about the ongoing battle to save the Red Squirrel.  With a car boot filled with bird and squirrel food we drove back east and set about replenishing all of the feeders.  Almost immediately the garden filled with birds, including 8 Long-tailed Tits and a dozen Chaffinches.  The predicted return of bitterly cold weather is likely to lead to a daily re-filling of the feeders.  Maybe we’ll even resurrect the Choppington Woods feeding station, although I think ourselves and all of our neighbours are providing an adequate supply…and the feeders are safer when they’re in our gardens

The feeders in our garden have been busier in the last couple of days than at any time during this winter.  No less than 6 Blackbirds have taken up residence, 3 or 4 Robins are posturing and defending territories, a steady stream of Blue, Great and Coal Tits, along with our 2 regular Willow Tits, are emptying the feeders rapidly and a flock of 8 Long-tailed Tits are putting in daily appearances.  Chaffinch numbers are way down on previous winters, but Greenfinches are now almost ever-present during daylight hours and three pairs of Bullfinches are never far away.  It’s interesting that, even on a very short-distance scale, there’s such a noticeable movement of birds from their ‘normal’ habitat (Choppington Woods) to the gardens around the edge of the woods whenever the weather turns colder.  Birdwatching doesn’t get any easier than sitting in the kitchen, glass of port in one hand and a slice of Christmas cake in the other

First thing this morning everything was frozen solid again.  However, by lunchtime when Martin took Dad to the railway station there was a noticeable thaw – even though the thermometer was showing the temperature having only just crept above freezing.  Then it started to rain and most of the remaining patches of ice and snow vanished.  The birds were still around in the numbers of recent days though and, if the weather forecasts are anything to go by, we’re in for some more very hard winter weather at the end of this year and the start of the new one.  Wrap up warm.

As Chair of Governors at our local First School, I had an invitation to attend the Christmas production this afternoon.  It was a heartwarming tale of a little fir tree who was teased for being so small but eventually found his place as a Christmas tree in a children’s hospital.  The characters included several fir trees, angels, snowflakes, raindrops, sunbeams, doctors, nurses, foxes, owls, rabbits and a woodcutter…as well as kings, shepherds, Mary and Joseph.

Which brings us nicely to the little fir tree on our patio.  I haven’t had as much time to work on my bonsai display as I would have liked this year (one of the perils of running your own business…) so most of the trees have developed dense, lush foliage.  I have been regularly trimming any over long shoots so they’re all still quite compact.  The display sits midway between six feeders in the apple tree and two feeders on the garden wall, so it’s a regular perch for many of the birds that are visiting.  As the weather has turned towards wintry, the number of birds in the garden has increased to the point where it’s almost impossible to watch everything that’s going on.  Sarah was at home this morning and we spent a little while just watching the comings and goings.  The highlight was two Willow Tits together but there were 15+ Coal Tits, 5 or 6 Bullfinches, 10 Chaffinches, 4 House Sparrows, 4 Greenfinches, a couple of Goldfinches and little groups of Blue and Great Tits.  Birdwatching begins at home…and once we get some cold, frosty or snowy weather, my bonsai display should produce some excellent photo opportunities as well.

A cold, wet mid-December night might not seem that promising in terms of wildlife but we had something new for the garden about an hour ago when a Winter Moth Operophtera brumata landed on the outside of the kitchen window.  Our little southeast Northumberland garden now has records of about 250 different species of moth.  It helps that there’s a 76ha woodland behind us though.