WEEK 4

 

The week began as it had the week before, at WWT Washington. A couple of months ago our bird ringing group were invited to take part in a new project being run by the team at the Wetlands, a project that revolves around the rapidly declining Willow Tit. The numbers of this species have fallen dramatically in recent years but they can still be found at the Wetlands and the team are wanting to manage the site in a way that secures the long term future of these gorgeous little birds. They've been working hard on a site management plan that benefits the Tits, and are also currently knocking together a number of nestboxes that are specifically designed with Willow Tits in mind. The boxes will be put up in the coming weeks and monitored throughout the breeding season. They're fairly sure they have at least three breeding pairs on site but are hoping to boost their numbers by providing more nesting opportunities. They also want to have a better idea of how many individuals are on the property, which is where the ringing group come in. The project team applied to the BTO to start a colour ringing scheme onsite, led by the WWT but delivered by ourselves. The aim of course is to catch as many Willow Tits as we can in the coming weeks before the breeding season kicks in and then hopefully follow their dispersal and monitor the nesting habits. We've started at one of the smaller feeding stations but hope to move around the site to maximise our chances of catching as many birds as possible. The Wetlands team are hoping to turn this into a fun citizen science program and will be encouraging visitors to look out for the ringed birds as they wander around the grounds. The beauty of using colour rings is they stand out more than the metal rings and you don't have to recatch the bird to record the sighting! So far we have only caught one Willow Tit but it's still very early days and are hoping to get more in the coming weeks. And of course, being a Sunderland supporter, we had to begin with Red and White! 🔴⚪

The last few weeks I've been getting round my various sites to try and clean out all of the nestboxes before the breeding season begins in a couple of months. I think I've mentioned before that it's something I hate doing, and one of the reasons is because of what is sometimes found inside. When you open up that lid you genuinely never know what you're going to come face to face with! I mean most of the time it's nothing, just an empty box or the remains of last years nest. Unfortunately though you do find the occasional dead bird, or unhatched egg, but more often it'll be a Woodmouse or two that looks up at you with a sheepish expression. Or even worse, jumps up at you giving you the shock of your life! Trust me, I don't care WHO you are, when something leaps towards you unexpectedly you nearly cack your pants. I've been there many, many times. But there's more, something way more unnerving than the cutesy little Woodmouse. I have to admit I have a bit of a love/hate relationship with spiders. I do genuinely love them, I find them amazingly fascinating creatures. But I absolutely hate them anywhere near me. And that's a problem when it comes to nestboxes, because spiders absolutely love them. So for me personally, there's nothing worse than opening the lid and finding a huge Giant House Spider looking right at me! But unfortunately it does happen. And I have to be a brave little boy and help them on their way. Urgh. Thankfully I managed to do the boxes at Souter this week which means all of my sites are done and I can breathe a sigh of relief. And next year, my friend Neil is not getting out of it and is coming with me so HE can deal with the spiders!!!

So last week I mentioned that myself and John had started the long and arduous job of prepping the timber for our annual nestbox event. We've had another couple of days doing it this week and we're slowly getting through it, and if we get a chance next week I imagine we'll get the rest done. Incase anyone is wondering why it's so time taking I've broken it down into numbers. There are 300 boxes in total. Each box has 6 parts. That's 1800 parts to cut. On top of that, we pre-drill each box, which means 3900 individual holes. You have to admit, that's ridiculously tedious!

And finally, the Workplace Wildlife Challenge! In all honesty I've been so busy with other stuff it's almost not even worth talking about! There's just been one addition to the list, but I will keep emphasising that it's very early in the year and there's plenty of time to boost the numbers up.

SPECIES LIST 

064 Common Scoter - Melanitta nigra