Short-eared Owl and lots of birdsong

I had another tantalisingly brief glimpse of an owl at a distance over the Steyning Levels this afternoon, but at least this time I got a good enough view to identify it as a Short-eared Owl.  I was actually looking at something else (which turned out to be a Herring Gull) when I caught sight of the owl hunting along the riverbank.   I followed it quite a long way, until I was momentarily distracted by a Green Woodpecker landing on a telegraph pole and it passed behind some trees.  But I got a good enough view to be sure it was a Short-eared.  The Green Woodpecker flew down onto the tussocky grass, and seemed to be finding something to eat on the waterlogged meadow.  I had been watching a flock of Linnets in the top of one the tallest Ash trees and listening to Songthrushes, Dunnocks, Great Tits, Bluetits, and Long-tailed tits.  As I returned along the outer bank of Bramber Castle in the dusk the sound of birdsong rose to a crescendo.  Quite an unusual occurrence at the end of January.

Bryophytes and Lichens on the Steyning Downland Scheme

Bryum capillare

Mosses are very abundant in the shady hangar woods that form part of the Steyning Downland Scheme.  This one, Bryum capillare is one of our commonest mosses but there are lots of others.   In a few minutes poking about (before it came on to rain) I found Hypnum andoi on a fallen Ash tree and Rhynchostegium confertum on the chalky rootplate of a fallen tree.

I took a look at some Lichens on twigs and found  Xanthoria parietina and Physcia tenella on Elder.

 Xanthoria parietina

Early Bird Survey Results

The BTO have put the first results of the Early Bird Survey up on their website. We took part in this on 9th January (see post of that date).  Nationally, Blackbird came first, but we did not see one in the first half hour after first light.  The birds we recorded were:

1. Bluetit - nationally 4th
2. Dunnock - nationally 5th
3. Chaffinch - nationally 14th.

3455 people took part nationwide, 53 in Sussex.  There is a complete list of the birds recorded with average times of first appearance after first light, and a map showing the locations of participants - there were two other people in Steyning.  They are still analysing the data on artificial light and that will come out in due course.  To see the results so far in full go to: http://blx1.bto.org/ebs/ebs-results.jsp.  

RSPB Big Garden Birdwatch

This morning, like many thousands of people across the country, we took part in the RSPB Big Garden Birdwatch.  Things got off to a slow start (we didn't get going until 08:35).  Two Dunnocks showed up first and then a flock of House Sparrows flew into the honeysuckle and attacked the seed feeder, sharing it with one or two Bluetits, but then.....nothing.  A female Pheasant stalked around, but for long periods there wasn't a single bird in sight.  We speculated on the possibility that there was a Sparrowhawk lurking unseen (to us) somewhere and, sure enough, one flew over, heading south away from the house at about 09:00.  The House Sparrows, Dunnock and Bluetits reappeared gradually and cautiously, but it was not until quarter past nine that Blackbirds, two Robins, and two Chaffinches appeared.  Compared with our normal range of visitors this was a poor show.  I found myself wishing for a Woodpigeon to put in an appearance! Daft. Finally one did show up and a late Great Tit arrived on the feeder just before the end of our hour.

Sussex Ornithological Society Conference

The SOS Annual Conference was held yesterday in Haywards Heath and Clair Hall was packed with enthusiastic birders to hear talks by Neil Gartshore on Poole Harbour, Colin Shawyer on Barn Owl conservation, Dr. Stephen Baillie on BirdTrack and Nigel Redman on African birds.  Many of us were there to pick up our copy of The Birds of Sussex which has just been published.  It quite exceeded my expectations. It is enormous, beautifully produced, full of wonderful photographs, detailed accounts of every species on the Sussex list, distribution maps and information about habitats.  It is an essential read for everyone interested in Sussex wildlife and is going to be useful source of reference for years to come.
Colin Shawyer is the leading light of Barn Owl conservation in the UK and gave us a fascinating update.  The number of breeding pairs has risen from a low nationwide of 3,800 to a present level of around 9,000.  The main reason for this recovery has been the increase in the use of artificial nest boxes; apparently 75% of pairs use them.  Much of the decline was due to loss of nesting sites through the change in use of agricultural buildings, but 30% of owls used old Elm trees as nest sites and these all disappeared long ago.  The other factor has been the loss of tussocky grass habitat and through his efforts, some has been reinstated.  Barn Owl numbers fluctuate with the Short-tailed field vole population.  I expect they will be down locally with the flooding that we have had.  I have hardly seen one this winter.
Dr Stephen Baillie is Director of Science at the British Trust for Ornithology and described changes to BirdTrack, including collaboration with other countries.  Work is underway with eBird in the US and other initiatives are planned.  It explained much about the use of BirdTrack data and impressed upon us the need to submit complete lists (which I usually do), not just the special birds, or earliest sightings.
In the lunch break I nipped out for a walk around the park and saw eight Siskins in an Alder tree.  I will be entering them on BirdTrack as a 'Roving Record' after I have finished this.

Bonfire Moss

One of the attractions of taking part in conservation tasks like scrub-bashing is the bonfire.  There has been quite a lot of scrub-bashing on the Steyning Downland Scheme, especially on Steyning Coombe, so there are a few bonfire sites.  Bonfire Moss, Funaria hygrometrica is a common early colonist of bare ground and is partial to old bonfires.  I found this clump on one yesterday, still shiny with dew.  It is easy to identify because it is usually covered in a forest of swan-necked setae with big capsules which seem out of all proportion to the size of the tiny moss plants that are carrying them.  It makes sense though, because early colonisers of temporary sites like this need to produce lots of spores quickly in order to disperse and re-establish somewhere else before they are swamped by later arrivals.

Lichens on Apple Trees

I have been pruning our old apple trees and looking at the lichens on the twigs from the top of one of the trees.  This one has three species: Xanthoria parietina (the yellow one), Ramalina farinaceae, (the feathery one) and Physcomia distorta, (the grey one).  Another twig had Flavoparmelia caperata.   Many of the older twigs are quite encrusted with lichens and I am going to be examining them to see how many species I can identify over the next few weeks as I get on with the winter pruning.  My enthusiasm for this project has been fired by the Natural History Museum's 'lichens on twigs key' on its website.  I must admit to finding lichens a difficult group and the keys in Dobson's guide are not the easiest to work with, especially if you do not have the chemicals and a high power microscope.  But this was a doddle and I would recommend anyone to give it a try.

Adur Valley

Before setting off up the riverbank this afternoon we spotted three kestrels 'interacting' between the Beech tree in our garden and the large Ash tree along the back path.  It was all too quick and confusing to make out what was going on, but it reminded us that a pair had made a failed attempt to nest in the Ash tree last year.  We do not know if it was the wet weather, or persecution by our aggressive local crows that caused them to abandon the nest, but they had gone when we returned from our holiday in Pembrokeshire.
The floods have subsided to a great extent in the meadows, but there was enough water to encourage about 40 Canada Geese to hang out over towards King's Barn.  Although the weather is now much calmer than it was before Christmas the Cormorants have stuck to their new regime of roosting in the lower levels of the most southerly pylon and have not returned to their more usual location on the tops of the other pylons. There were about 30 of them. Also over by King's Barn were five Little Egrets, and there were seven more over on the Beeding side of the river.  I have not seen one in the area this winter until today.  We have not seen any owls lately, either, but caught a tantalising glimpse of a what was possibly a Short-eared Owl over the other side of the river flitting past hedgerows.

Steyning Downland Scheme Birdwatch

The Management Team in action near the Rifle Range

The weather was near-perfect for our first bird survey of 2014 and we logged a respectable tally of 20 species.  There were 22 Teal on the lower pond, which is a surprisingly large number.  We could hear them from way back before we crept up to the hide.  A short distance away up the track there was an unusually large group of Magpies - 17- in one tree.  It is common to see half-a-dozen together, 17 is a lot and they seemed very excited about something.
There were Treecreepers and a Great-spotted Woodpecker.  We never seemed to be out of earshot of Robins, while Songthrushes, Dunnocks and Greenfinches were all heard singing like it was spring.
The small grazing herd of Sussex Red cattle have been back for quite a while now and are munching their way through a lot of the long grass on the hillsides.

Beeding Brooks

It has been a frustrating time not being able to get across to Beeding Brooks since mid-summer because the footbridge was closed for repair.  They finished the work on Christmas Eve and re-opened it, but since then it has been too wet.  My first attempt at our usual tour of the meadows and the riverbank was blocked by a flooded path, but I finally got round yesterday. A couple of Greylag Geese flew over, but there was no sign of the flock of about 100 that I had seen on that side of the river recently.  There were Fieldfares, a Songthrush and a little flock of Skylarks.
Over towards Horton on the east side there was a large flock of Lapwing.  They were too far away to count, but large groups were taking to the air, rising up, circling round and settling again.  The flocks flashed black to white and back to black as they banked and turned.  Later as I approached the river, a Sparrow Hawk flipped over a high hedge, swerved as it caught sight of me, and then dived down to knee height and flew low and purposefully towards Horton.

Bluetits prospecting

A pair of Bluetits were examining a hole in one of our old apple trees this morning.  This hole has been used by Bluetits for nesting for many years, but this seems like an early date for a pair to be showing an interest.

Sidlesham Ferry and Church Norton.

Although the main reason for coming here is to see wildfowl and waders, it was a special treat to see Greenfinches on the bird feeders near the pond dipping area.  These used to be so common and such regular visitors to our garden, but now we rarely see them in the garden or indeed anywhere locally.  Hopefully they will make a comeback soon and they will become regular visitors again.
At the Ferry Pool there were Shelduck, Wigeon and others, but the birds that stole the show were Shovellers. The males were looking very smart in fresh plumage and showing off to the females quite a lot.
The combination of the high tide in the morning and the recent rainfall meant that the path was flooded and we could not take our usual walk along the east side of the harbour to the beach, so we took a short walk along the old Selsey tramway towards Sidlesham.  There were quite a lot of Wigeon and some Curlew in the salt marsh and a Buzzard in the scrub area.  Great tits seemed to be in full song here, but not loud enough to wake up a fox comfortably curled up having a snooze on a sunny bank.
At Church Norton the moat around the Norman Castle site was half full of water.  I have never seen it like that before!  The tide was starting to fall quite rapidly as we walked round on to the shingle bar and lots of waders, mostly Dunlin with Redshank, Grey Plover, Oystercatchers and a couple of Bar-Tailed Godwits. There were lots of Turnstones on the old harbour wall, but these moved off towards the beach as the tide fell.  Over on the eastern side we saw several huge flocks of Lapwing turning and wheeling in the distance. A couple of redheads (female/imm. Red-breasted Mergansers) were diving in the harbour mouth. Cormorants were roosting on the shingle bank and some of them were showing the white patches under the wing area that is part of the breeding plumage.
Earlier as we drove round to Church Norton we saw a large (500+) flock of Brent Geese in a field and from the end of the shingle spit where we ate our lunch we heard them fly over and land at the east side of the harbour about half a mile away.  Sadly they had retreated to the field by the time we got round there.

West Weald Pond Survey

One of the survey ponds, now overgrown and silting up

Last year I took part in a survey of the ponds in the West Weald Landscape Area.  The results have just been published and they are, not surprisingly, rather disappointing.  Few of the ponds were in good condition and most, with a few notable exceptions are declining.  The problem is, of course, that many of them no longer serve a useful purpose.  They were mostly man-made, created by damming streams in order to water livestock or drive some industrial process. Now, either the livestock have gone or water is piped to the fields or brought in bowsers.
The West Weald Landscape Area is mainly in West Sussex, and includes the Low Weald area north of Petworth.  The objective of the survey was to get some baseline data on the state of ponds in the area.  20 one kilometre grid squares were selected at random and all of the ponds in each square were surveyed (or at least a survey was attempted).  I did two squares, four ponds in total.  We were given a short training session in the survey protocol at the Sussex Wildlife Trust headquarters at Woods Mill.  This included some simple water quality tests, pond dipping for invertebrates, identifying plants and animals including invasive species and making a sketch map.  Landowner permission was obtained and one of the objectives was for the organisers to connect with landowners and offer help and advice on wildlife issues.
Getting to my ponds involved some long walks and pushing through some dense vegetation.  It was actually great fun, especially pond dipping with the little net: an opportunity to reconnect with your inner eleven-year-old!  One of my ponds was in pretty good condition and the owner had a programme of restoration in hand.  It seemed to be the top one of a now disused chain of ponds which had been created by damming a stream cutting down through a short, narrow valley.  These probably had some sort of industrial application and from the name of the area there might have been a connection with the cloth trade.

Beeding Hill

A big effort is being made to restore chalk grassland on the northwestern side of Beeding Hill.  A lot of invasive scrub has been removed and the area has been fenced to enable grazing.  I am looking forward to visiting the area over the next few summers to see if this pays off in an increase in wild flowers and insects.  One of the photos show the area where the scrub has been cleared and the other shows the area where there is a lot of coarse grass (Tor grass Brachpodium pinnatum) which tends to swamp everything else.  I found Bee Orchids Orchis apifera up here many years ago and I hope to find them again one day.
The second photo also shows the floods in the upper Adur Valley as they were this morning, having receded somewhat.

Garden Birdwatch

We have been sending records to the British Trust for Ornithology (BTO) Garden Birdwatch scheme since 2000.  Each week we keep a note of the birds that we see in our garden and record them on a form.  For some of the more common species we keep a check on numbers and for others we just tick 'present'.   Participants send in their records every quarter and these are entered in a national database.  Participants can check their past records with the data presented in a number of formats.  I have been taking a look at our records and we have reported 50 species of birds over the period of 13 years (the all-time Sussex list now stands at 399, for comparison).  Blue tit, Woodpigeon, Blackbird, Robin, Dunnock, Great Tit, Magpie, and House Sparrow in that order of frequency were present on 87% or more of the weeks on which we reported.   Then there is a sharp drop to the next most frequent species which is the Chaffinch, present in just 67% of the weeks we have recorded.  Carrion Crow, Wren, Collared Dove, Long-tailed tit, Great Spotted Woodpecker, Nuthatch. Song Thrush, Coal Tit, Greenfinch and Goldfinch are the next in order of appearance.  There are some birds that are genrally considered to be very common in this part of the world, but rarely visit our garden.  Starling and Jackdaw are two birds that are common in the neighbourhood, but only occasionally call on us.

Blue tit, Blackbird, Robin, Wren, House Sparrow and Mallard have all nested in our garden and we hope to see some of them doing so again this summer (except the Mallard!)

Hazel Catkins

Hazel, Corylus avellana  is always one of the earliest things to come into flower, but it still comes as a surprise to see fully developed catkins like these so early in January.  Yesterday was lovely spring-like day and Robins were singing, Chaffinches were 'pinking' and Great tits calling 'teacher, teacher'.  Near Nore Folly seven Buzzards were making the most of the sunshine and soaring on a thermal and we caught a glimpse of a butterfly (to brief to identify it) and a hoverfly which at first we thought was a bumble bee.  All of these are false signs of spring and no doubt we will return to winter conditions shortly.

Rain, rain, go away.

The rain gauge was empty this morning.  This is the first time since December 16 2013 - 27 days. In that time we have had 254mm (10 inches) of rain.  This is an unusually long period of rainy days in this part of the world and 254mm is a great deal to fall in a month.  Over the whole of 2013 we had 735mm of rain and rain fell on 93 days.  That was fairly typical for this part of the world.  There was a 14 day spell of rain producing just 80mm in total, but generally rain rarely fell on periods of more than four days.  The amount of rain that fell in the27 day period was equivalent to a third of the rain that would fall in a typical year.  There were also periods of high winds and stormy weather during the month.  We have had mild temperatures in the range 8-12 degrees C, with often little difference between day and nighttime temperatures.

We have suffered no damage and little inconvenience as a result, unlike others whose homes have been flooded and their power cut off.  The floods in the Adur Valley were spectacular, but harmless. The meadows store the water and prevent catastrophic floods further downstream.

Global climate change models forecast weather patterns of this type for this part of the world.  It would be wrong to claim that this or any other period of weather is evidence of global warming.  That would be cherry-picking the data, the climate change deniers favourite trick.  After all, the rest of the year was pretty normal, but it might be an indication of what the climate has in store for us.

Floods in the Adur Valley.

Out and About

Yesterday we walked up the riverbank to view the floods and saw a lot of Fieldfares and Redwings in the hedgerows.  There seem to be few berries in the hedges and as the ground is flooded it is not clear what they are finding to feed on around here.  Pied Wagtails, on the other hand were finding the conditions to their liking at the edge of the floods.

The Red-breasted Mergansers were still at Widewater today.  They were still feeding very busily, but one of the males was finding time to display to one of the females who did not seem to be too interested.  Apparently this winter displaying is quite normal and they do it so that they do not waste any time on it when they return to their breeding grounds.  There were a dozen Little Grebes again, and a Little Egret looking cool and elegant while trying to catch some lunch.

The beach defences seem to have held up well to the battering they have had over the last few weeks, but a lot of shingle has shifted and the Environment Agency is busy pushing it back up again.

Early Bird Survey

We have just taken part in the BTO Early Bird Survey.  This involves recording the birds that arrive on your bird feeders at first light - which species and at what times.  It got light here at 08:00 and first up were two bluetits, then a Dunnock at 08:05 and then another Bluetit and a male Chaffinch at 08:14.  We stopped at 08:30 and had just had return visits from those species.  There was a Robin singing in the dark at 07:15, but that did not count in the survey.  We had to record cloud cover: 100%, and maximum and minimum temperature overnight: 11C, dropping to 9C.  They were also interested in the location of streetlights.  You can still take part in this up to 12th January.  Go to http://www.bto.org/volunteer-surveys/gbw/about/background/projects/early-bird-survey for details.

Adur Levels

This is not a lake! 

From the Black Sewer outfall to Wyckham  Dale Farm and beyond was one continuous sheet of water, broken only by the high hedges.  It probably extended as far as Stretham Manor, although I did not walk up as far as that. It was windy, so the Cormorants were not roosting at the top of the electricity pylons, but they could not roost on the higher patches of ground as they usually do either because all was underwater, so they were occupying the lower rungs of the pylons.  There were about 60 of them.  These fields flood most winters, but I have never seen it like this.  The water in places was up to within a foot of the tops of the gate posts.  On the east side of the river there was no flooding and the suckler herd of Sussex Red cattle were grazing in the fields and so was a flock of about 100 Greylag geese.  It was late afternoon and flocks of gulls were heading south towards the sea and large flocks of starlings were heading southeast, presumably to roost (were they heading for the Brighton piers?)  I saw five flocks of up to 200 birds in each and several smaller ones, so about 1000 birds.
While I was watching the Greylag flock, a Kestrel which had been hovering nearby, flew past and landed on a fence post a few yards away and remained there for a couple of minutes.  It is not often that a Kestrel behaves in this confiding way and this is the second time I have had an encounter of this sort along the riverbank.  Perhaps this bird has become used to people using this path and has lost its reserve.  However it had been hunting over the riverbank, which got me thinking about the field voles that inhabit the now flooded fields.  Have some of them migrated to the riverbank to avoid drowning creating a feeding opportunity for the Kestrel too good to allow it to be interrupted by a human, or was the Kestrel facing a food shortage because the field voles had drowned and its usual hunting grounds were under water?

Red-breasted Mergansers

Yesterday as I cycled past Widewater there were six Red-Breasted Mergansers at the eastern end.  They often turn up here in the winter, but I do not think I have ever seen as many as six at a time before.  There were two adult males and four 'redheads' and they were all very busy feeding.  They were bobbing up and down at an almost frenetic rate.  The water is shallow, so even if they are they were feeding at the bottom they were not having to go very far and so they were diving and surfacing very quickly.  They seem to be successful, coming to the surface with something in their bills quite often.  I could not make out what it was at the distance, but worms(?) about 5cm long seemed to be quite common.  Presumably the recent stormy weather had driven them here.  

Also busily feeding were at least 15 Little Grebes.  They were not maintaining the pace that the Mergansers had set, but they were active enough to make it difficult for me to be confident of my count.  Apart from that there were the usual little flock of feral ducks that have inhabited the lagoon for years and if there were any other birds, they were keeping down out of the wind.  Except the seagulls who seem to be enjoying the wind and surf blowing in.  Waves were high enough to push some shingle over the wooden wall on to the path.  It will be interesting to see what has happened to the sea defences when the wind is down and tide is out.

Pagham Beach closed after sea defences breached

I have just seen a report on the BBC website of a breach in sea defences near the spot that I wrote about in my blog of 30 December 2013.  See http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-sussex-25611938 for more details.

Corn Buntings on Steyning Round Hill

The call of a Corn Buntings is one of the things we tend to associate with warm summer days and so hearing them on the Downs on a cold winters day reminds us that summer will return - eventually.  We had driven up to Steyning Round Hill to walk along to Chanctonbury and take advantage of a bright, clear, cold morning before the weather returned to wet and windy.  There were at least four of them, plump and heavy-billed in comparison to the Yellowhammers and Reed Buntings they were associating with.  The Reed Buntings caused me the usual head-scratching.  They were female/immature birds and so lacked the distinctive black and white markings of the adult summer male and they seem so out of context.  They should be down on the Brooks - not up here on the ploughed fields!

Where the path down towards Findon splits off the South Downs Way there is a strip of woodland.  Two Buzzards were perched in Hawthorn trees on the edge.  The darker of the two sat still, while the paler one, restless, flew up and down along the edge of the field, returning to perch near its mate several times.  Later, on our return, we saw a Buzzard, possibly the darker of the two, being mobbed by crows nearby.

Nearing Chanctonbury a Peregrine flew over, circled  around us and then headed south.  Then there was a Kestrel hanging quite motionless on the updraft from Well Bottom.  For long periods it hardly seemed to need to flick a feather to remain motionless and hold its station.  No other bird has that skill.

Now that all the leaves are down it is possible to see the full extent of the growth of new trees planted to replace those blown down by the Great Storm of 1987.  There is a way to go yet, but they are making progress.

Birling Gap Cliff Fall

I have just noticed news reports of a cliff fall at Birling Gap (see post of 21 November 2013).  Apparently, about it has a depth of about 3m, but there is no indication of the length of the fallen section.  We have had heavy rainfall over the last three weeks with stormy conditions and high tides so it is not clear the extent to which the decline in beach shingle will have had on effect in causing this.  I will try to post before and after photos when we have been for a visit - which might not be for a few weeks.  There has also been a spectacular fall at Rock-a-Nore near Hastings with a video posted on the BBC website.