Back to Basics and Local Birding. End of July 2020

25th July; Green Matters

With little happening on the birding front nationally and in need of a quiet weekend after a busy time at work and the longish drive to see the Lammergeier yesterday, our Saturday birding was limited to just an hour or so at our local reserve, Bicester Wetlands (BWR). So far this year we've been guilty of largely ignoring the oasis of calm on the edge of our ever growing and bustling town. Lockdown meant that for a while BWR was out of bounds since we weren't allowed to drive there and it's a five mile round walk to get there and back with just uninspiring, depressing in fact, concrete and brick to look at on the way. Hence we had chosen to take a farmland walk to Ardley Quarry, just as far but much nicer, as our staple during March and April. Then when more mobility was allowed we got back into Otmoor, spending a lot of time enjoying the solitude, tranquility, the emergence of spring and the newly arrived birds out on the Moor. So our call in at BWR was actually our first proper visit to the reserve since February!

Luckily we have a very dedicated warden of BWR. Alan had kept an eye on the place almost daily, as he always does, and had provided constant updates on what birds he'd seen during the past few months. It had been quiet in general and in truth we hadn't missed much but over the previous couple of weeks Green Sandpipers had returned in numbers to the shallow reed fringed pools. BWR is the primary spot for Green Sandpipers in Oxfordshire and they are present in most months during the year. A few days before Alan had counted eighteen on the reserve and just yesterday they had been joined by a Greenshank.

It was a drizzly dreich day as we parked up by the Tower Hide overlooking the main pool. The pool itself was largely empty of birds, testament to the large scale work that was taking place at the adjoining water treatment works, a growing town needs a bigger waste management plant. So we walked across the rough field to the Cattle Bridge Pool and the relatively new hide there, where we imagined the wading birds would be. Approaching the pool is difficult without scaring any birds away because the natural hedge screen is yet to grow tall or dense enough and the steps up into the hide are exposed but we did our best. We opened the hide windows and looked out on absolutely nothing! Not a single wading bird, or any bird for that matter, at all. We'd just have to wait and see if the Sandpipers would return and since it had begun raining heavily outside it made sense to sit tight anyway. Less than five minutes later I heard the high pitched tri-syllabic call of a Green Sandpiper and then two of the compact sturdy thrush sized waders landed in the shallow pool. They looked around nervously for a few moments then began feeding.

Green Sandpiper

After my rather muddled thinking in a previous blog about why do we have birds named with the prefix, 'Common', I also often wonder why we call some birds by colours that they clearly are not. Green Sandpipers never look green, at least they don't to my eyes, and are in fact more blackish or maybe dark brown. Of course the purists will say that they are greeny-brown but if that's the case why aren't they called Greeny-brown Sandpipers? I know, I'm being pedantic again, but surely the colour blind ornithologists who named this bird could have come up with something better. The Greenshank, one of our UK birds that has managed to shake of its Common tag, flew in and joined the pair of Green Sandpipers. It too was wary at first before proceeding to feed. Courtesy of its longer legs it was able to stride slightly further out from the edge of the pool. Greenshank means 'green-legged' and for the life of me I have never seen a Greenshanks legs as green. They are grey. Okay at a push they are greeny-grey but they're not green not in the sense that I know green, eg grass green or lime green. Why wasn't it called a 'Greyshank' or a 'Green-greyshank'? I apologise for even more ridiculous over exacting.

Greenshank

Over the next hour another six Green Sandpipers flew and joined the others and we watched them all either feeding or at rest on the muddy edge to the pool. Hopefully the shallow water and the healthy amount of exposed mud will attract a rarer wading bird to the reserve over the next few months. 

We tend to think of a Greenshank as one of our larger wading birds and conversely of a Black-headed Gull as one of our smaller Gull species, of which both is true. But see both birds stood in close proximity and you realise just how much smaller the Greenshank is of that pair. And yet it towers above the Green Sandpipers. Not proof of anything but when you consider how much bigger a Green Sandpiper is compared to Dunlin and the like then you get to appreciate just how small they are. Incredible then that all of those wading birds travel so far on their migration journeys, thousands of miles every year.

Black-headed Gull & Greenshank

Greenshank & Green Sandpiper

The Swifts and hirundines that were using the pool for in-flight drinking also travel long distances and most will be leaving for their wintering grounds in southern parts of Africa soon. The hide is too far away from the water to enable getting good images of them though. There was a break in the weather so we seized our chance and went for a restful rest of the day at home. It felt good not having a two hundred mile drive home for a change!

26th July; Fir the Love of Woods

Crossbill, is another bird that has generally managed to shed it's Common prefix unless being compared to the much rarer species in its family such as the Parrot and Two-barred varieties. In keeping with many "common" birds, they are not that common in our area so don't really deserve that common moniker and "Scarce Crossbill" would be more accurate. They can be hard to find owing to their quiet habits and the fact that they generally rely on conifer plantations and forests for their food trees, they are pine cone specialists, none of which are plentiful in Oxfordshire. We had already tried to find some in one of the more reliable spots, at Buckland Warren near Faringdon, without success earlier in the year and thus they were missing from our year list, again normally we would have seen them in Scotland on our holiday but as you will know by now, coronavirus stopped that from happening. A friend and fellow birder Jon, famous locally for finding the Red-rumped Swallow at Grimsbury Reservoir last May, recently posted on Twitter about a flock of Crossbills that he'd found in Bucknell Wood near Silverstone, in Northamptonshire, just twenty miles away from home and actually closer than the Oxon site. To my shame I had never visited Bucknell Wood despite driving past it countless times while working in the surrounding area. The wood is famous as a site for seeing Purple Emperors and other unusual Butterflies in the summer but not being that bothered with small fluttery things, seen one you've seen them all, and having Bernwood Forest (oxymoronic name, maybe not, but unusual to have two words that essentially meant the same thing next to each other) on our doorstep, even those have never pulled Mrs Caley and myself in. 

Crossbills though do have that pulling power and after gaining some information on the likely spots within the wood to find them we set out early on Sunday morning, arriving just after half past seven. Only one car was already parked although another arrived just after us. Any wood with good paths attract dog-walkers these days which is fine with me as long as the dogs are kept on leads and their waste is cleaned up but unfortunately too many are left to maraud at will through sensitive habitat and wildlife no doubt suffers as a result. I do not have a lot of time for irresponsible dog owners. Thankfully the two chaps kept their charges in good order but still managed to shatter the peacefulness of the wood and the trees by talking ever so loudly. Why do people have to shout when they're in quiet places? We waited a couple of minutes to allow the two guys to get well ahead and then followed up the path. As it was there was little to see and hear, most birds would be busy feeding broods now, and the trees here are big and very leafy so any birds would be hard to find. Jon had pointed us towards the belt of Larch and Spruce at the top of the wood about half a mile from the car and where the Crossbills should be.

We reached a crossroads of paths and stood enjoying the early morning sunshine. To the left a path ran straight through a stand of conifer trees. I scanned the tops of the nearest trees and was amazed to instantly spot a couple of Crossbills in one of them. I do love an easy "twitch"! I took a couple of record shots just before the Crossbills exploded noisily out of the tree, astonishingly eight of the chunky finches flew out of the tree and the one next to it and I had only noticed two. When I studied the photos later I saw that they contained four of the eight!

The birds had flown back into just a few conifers that stand by the path that we'd just walked up. I know from experience of watching lots of Crossbills in Scotland that they are birds that rarely stay still for long and are always flying from one tree to another, sometimes into a nearby tree but also often to trees much further away, thus they can be frustrating birds to follow. When they move, whether as a flock or singularly, they frequently call excitedly and often the first indication that Crossbills are present is when you hear those calls. I re-found the Crossbills and saw that the small flock contained a couple of males, not quite in brick-red breeding plumage but still "in the pink". I had to peer through overhanging branches to get a record shot.

male Common Crossbill

The birds took flight and amazingly were joined by more that must have been already feeding in the trees. I took a quick count as they all flew off and reckoned there were over twenty but my attempts at grabbing a photo failed. The whole flock of Crossbills had flown well into the woods and were lost from sight so we rejoined the cross path with the majority of conifer trees and enjoyed the stroll in the early morning sunshine. A Roebuck was also out and about and stood on the path just fifty metres ahead eyeing us up slightly less suspiciously than usual, before slinking off into the wood.

Roe Deer

We heard the Crossbills again, looked up and saw the flock passing overhead. I reckon that there were about twenty-five but without getting a static photo I couldn't be sure of the exact number. In any case it was a good sized flock and was in keeping with other gatherings being seen up and the country, except in Oxfordshire of course where there were none. Lots of Crossbills had been observed migrating southwards over the last month or so and some had obviously stayed put in the UK. The Crossbills had landed en masse into three very tall trees about a hundred metres ahead of us so we made our way there. Here they seemed settled and were feeding on the small cones borne by the fir trees, I don't do trees, although I know that I should, so don't know what exact type of tree. 

juvenile Common Crossbill

The flock of Crossbills were noisy while feeding and moved around the trees frequently, presumably seeking out the best cones. Most were of the green-grey female type with quite a few juveniles mixed in and I only noticed just the couple of males. As far as I could tell they were all staying right near the top of the trees so getting decent photos was difficult with the reach of my lens.

A female descended lower on one of the trees and afforded us better views. It was joined by a couple of juvenile birds but despite much pestering they were ignored by the older bird. Now I had a better photographic opportunity.

female Common Crossbill

There were Siskins as well as Crossbills in the woods, the two species are often seen together since they are both conifer tree specialists. A small flock of around ten Siskin were at the top of a nearby tree and I paid them some attention. Siskins can also be hard to find in Oxfordshire, the last I saw in the county was back in February at Dix Pit, so it was good to see some here in Northants. There were frequent squabbles amongst the Siskins and a couple flew out in a fluttering tumble.

Siskin

The Crossbills disappeared off into another part of the wood again so we resumed our walk, noting lots of common woodland birds along the way. Jon had told us that the wood was a good spot for Spotted Flycatcher but we failed to find any but to be fair our interest lay with the Crossbills so we didn't leave the conifer stands. We saw the Crossbills for the last time back in the trees where we first saw them. The wood was becoming busy with many dog-walkers, some not bothering to leash their dogs and when a Roebuck appeared again it was chased by a Labrador into the undergrowth. Why can't some people act responsibly and keep their dogs under control. When a noisy family came walking towards us carrying take away coffees and milkshakes then it was time to go. I just sincerely hoped that the plastic cups were taken home to be disposed off in a bin and not discarded as litter although I had my doubts. It puzzles me why folk with no interest in nature choose to visit nature reserves and act so selfishly with seemingly little or no regard for the beautiful surroundings in which they walk or for the wildlife that lives there.