Just before I get started I would first like to apologise for the lack of blog posts over the last month or so. This may sound like a poor excuse but I have been working everyday (including weekends) on the Nightjar Project and now that my time on the project has come to an end for this year it is time to reflect on some incredible wildlife experiences. When I set about this project at the beginning of June I set my self a target and that was to try and get as many lifers as possible and for a change I wasn't aiming for Species of Birds. I thought that it would be a good idea to try and 'summarise' as much as possible the last 29 days of my placement. There have been some truly unforgettable moments that i will try my best to shorten into this post. Lets see how i do. The 1st of June. Which was the day which any normal student would have been heading to summer ball in order to mark the end of their first year at uni, but not for me. Tonight was the first Night of my placement and we were heading out onto the heath in order to attempt to catch and ring some Nightjars and if possible fit them with a Radio tag as well. The Dorset Nightjar Study Group is a collaboration between the Stour Ringing Group, Bournemouth Uni, and Bio Track in order to find out what is happening to our Nightjars on Urban heaths and to try and learn more about this understudied species foraging habits. This year we have been out on 3 heaths across the Bournemouth and Poole Conurbation and have learnt an awful lot, however the weather has unfortunately not helped us at all this year. The first night was however a success with 2 Males being caught. One was a re-trap from last year and he was a no brainer for fitting a radio tag onto. The other was an un-ringed Male who we believe was returning for his 1st year and was aged as a 5. He became known as 44 and was the first Nightjar that I have ever rung. It was an awsome experience and a radio tag was also fitted onto him. (Male Nightjar 44 picture below) This Nightjar was a year tick for me but wasn't the only bird year tick of the evening for me as earlier we had a Crossbill fly over the car calling which is always a special bird to see. Having not done any proper moth trapping before Brians DIY Moth trap made for an easy way to edge into the season. At every Tagging and Ringing session this year we were going to be running Moth traps in order to find out why the Nightjars are picking these areas and also to see which species are about. For those that don't know Nightjars feast almost entirely on Moths so its important to know what they are eating and the diversity of those species as well. Above: Brown Silver Lines Below: Fox Moth Above: Willow Beauty Below: Satin Wave Over the next couple of days are task was to head back to the heath in order to track our tagged birds all was going well when we managed to locate our Southern Male (the re-trap) roosting in and amongst some Birch trees. Then 44 was located however his tag had unfortunately fallen off and we eventually managed to track it down and find it. Above: Southern Male Below: 44 Interestingly 44 was roosting just next to the main footpath at head height so how people were just walking past him oblivious is beyond me and must be full credit to its chameleon like appearance. While we were out on the heath i had my first lifer which were several Heath Spotted Orchids. ({Pictured Below) The next few days the weather was dreadful, however we still had to head to the heath during the gaps in the weather. We unsurprisingly had no more sign of 44 however, upon occasion our Southern Male would be roosting with a female and with another Male lurking nearby so perhaps that male could have been 44? We continued to find our Southern Male in his usual spot hardly ever venturing away except when the Dartmoor Ponies were about. Lifers were also to be head during the gaps in the rain showers with my first ever Green Hairstreaks putting in a show on a bramble bush. Above: Green Hairstreak Below: Southern Male Being out on the heath everyday also meant that I had plenty of opportunities to see some of the birds that inhabit the area. This has included daily Stonechats and their noisy fledglings, as well as plenty of Dartford Warblers, Siskin, Greenfinch, and Linnet. Another lifer was also on offer in the form of Large Red-eyed Damselfly which were quite numerous on the various water bodies across the heath. Above: Male Stonechat Below: Large Red-eyed Damselfly The next Ringing and tagging session was interesting with 3 birds being caught. 2 Re-trap males and a female. They were all fitted with radio tags. We also yet again had some moth traps going at the same time and managed to catch our first Hawk Moth of the Season which was a Pine. Above: Pine Hawk Moth Below: True Lovers Knot Above: Iron Prominent Below: Ichneumon Wasp The following week was interesting with our usual Southern Male the only bird that we could get signal from the vast majority of the time. Another Male which was a re-trap was briefly picked up in some gardens for a day and a bird tagged from the Northern side randomly reappeared after a couple of days. This bird was named 7595 after the frequency of the tag. He seemed to favour roosting directly above the main footpaths, but yet again mysteriously vanished. The weather had now started to improve and thus when we found our first Sand Lizard of the season it was hardly surprising that it was just lounging about on one of the main footpaths. Another lifer was to be had with the first Silver Studded Blues of the season emerging. On the first day that we found 7595 back on the heath we also stumbled upon a Bullfinch nest, but when we went back to try and ring the chicks we found that the nest had fledged. Above: Sand Lizard Below: Our Southern Male Above: House Martin Below: Silver Studded Blue Above: Bullfinch Below: 7595 showing just how hard it is to find these birds during the day time. Above: Our Southern Male in his usual spot The next few days the weather was shocking again and thus very little happened. Another evening session saw us catch 2 new females but no tags were fitted due to the fact that we hadn't yet received any back yet. 44 was also re-caught each time we went out which was interesting to see how quickly they put on weight during the summer after migrating. We also were given the chance to head out and watch some behaviour and map out territories of the males and this gave us some incredible views of the birds. It was amazing to watch them interacting with each other. Wing clapping calling and Churring within metres of me. Above: Bat sp, I never wrote down the species but if my memory serves me correct then i think it was a Noctule The next week or so the weather continued to be a bit hit and miss however towards the middle of the month the weather showed signs of improvement. This improvement in the weather gave us the chance to head out onto our other two heaths. The larger one is just like something out of the Savannah with large Pine trees dotted around the largely Heath and Gorse landscape. The other heathland is a small heath near to the Uni and its interesting to observe the Nightjars here. There are at least 4 churring males in the area and several females as well. Its interesting to observe their behaviour since there are very few trees in the centre of the heath the males tended to churr from the very tops of Powerlines as well as the pylons and telephone wires that criss cross the heath. Its was also interesting to find out that their territories seemed to overlap as well meaning that they almost acted as a combined defense force for the heath. One of the times I ventured onto the heath and intruding male came in from the Northern Corner of the heath drawing at least 3 of the local males out to great it. There was a full 20 or 30 minutes of extreme wing clapping over the heath as the birds fought off the intruder. It was quite something to witness especially as these birds seem not to mind my presence and at times were with centimetres of me. Back to our usual heath and as the warmer weather arrived it brought with it more Silver Studded Blues and also some of the local raptors including a Buzzard with a shot out wing. It also brought about a change in our Southern Males position as he seaked shelter from the heat. An increase in species diversity in the resident insect population was also noticeable as some species started to make up for lost time. Above: our Southern Male Below: Silver Studded Blue Above: Common Buzzard Below: Green Hairstreak Above: Southern Male Below: Azure Damselfly Above: Large Red Damselfly Below: Red Admiral Above: Green Hairstreak Below: Silver Studded Blue Above: Southern Male Below: Broad-bodied Chaser Above: What I believe to be a Mottled Grasshopper Below: House Martins collecting mud for their nests Another extremely warm day saw the whole Nightjar team head off the heath in order to help Thomas with his Greylag Goose Project. This involved rounding up 83 moulting Greylags off one of the lakes in order to attempt to ring them. The aim of this project is to see how far these geese go since at this time of year 250 arrive in Poole Park to moult before dispersing. There has been no Greylag Geese ringing in Dorset so very little is known about their movement between sites. Earlier in the year I had two come in off the channel in poor weather which might suggest that there is some movement of continental populations to the Poole Harbour area so we are eagerly awaiting the results of the study. Any re-sightings of these birds would be gratefully appreciated. Look out for Greylag Geese with white ring / black letters beginning with 'U' followed by 3 digits! If you do find one then please submit it through EUring or by messaging Thomas on twitter. The Greylags weren't the only things about on the day so here are some photo's. Above: Mute Swan Cygnet Below: Greylag Goslings Above: Oystercatcher in an Urban surrounding amongst a flock of Black-headed Gulls. Below: Mallard plus Ducklings Above: What I believe to be Chicory Below: The first of an invasion of Painted Ladies The next Moth trapping and ringing session was poor in terms of birds caught with 44 the only bird of the night. However the warmer weather had now brought out a whole array of new species for us in terms of Moths with some really crackers. Above: Scorched Wing Below: Heart and Dart Above: Common Swift Moth Below: Lime Hawk Moth Having a head torch does have some advantages especially when I picked up the glinting eyes of this toad as he crossed the path in front of us. This also lead us to find the Raft Spider pictured above. Above: Clouded Buff Below: Pine Hawkmoth Above: Privet Hawkmoth (I didn't realise just how big they were. This one was the size of my hand... Incredible) The next few days were incredibly hot and with a Southerly wind it allowed for a mass arrival of Migrating insects including Southern Hawkers, Red Admirals and also hundreds if not thousands of Painted Lady Butterflies. Everything was full of life and hard to photograph. Silver Studded Blues seemed to now be emerging on mass and i finally stumbled upon two more lifers in the form a Keeled Skimmer which i watch as it flew up high in pursuit of a fly for lunch however left itself vulnerable to a patrolling Male Emperor Dragonfly which simply ambushed the Skimmer. Not exactly how i thought the first time i saw a Keeled Skimmer would go. Thankfully the coming days were equally as warm and therefor there were plenty more Keeled Skimmers on the wing. The other lifer of this time period for me was a Golden-ringed Dragonfly there were a few males dotted around the heaths however none would sit long enough or a photo. Above: Silver Studded Blue Below: Painted Lady Above: Keeled Skimmers With a week left of the placement and over 9 tagged birds having disappeared off our heaths we decided to have a trip round the other local Dorset heaths most of which i had never been to before. It was yet another sizzling day with temperatures now up near the 30 degree mark and crystal clear skies over head. We visited a total of 11 heaths and clocked up a total of 90miles and to our surprise we managed to find one our tagged birds. Yep that's right we found 7595 the Male we ringed on the Northern part of our main study site. This was a revelation however as always we found his tag giving off signal from private land over at Studland. We figured out that he must be patrolling 2 territories. I have to admit we were fully expecting to be ruling out sites that they could have gone to rather than actually finding them so this was somewhat of a success and was celebrated all round. The trip wasn't completely wasted though as when we were in Wareham Forest we stumbled upon my first ever British Beautiful Demoiselle along side the commoner Banded Demoiselle. There is something just captivating about this species but i will come onto that shortly. Another Butterfly species was added to my year list with Ringlet and a surprise birding addition came in the shape of 3 singing Male Yellowhammer on the edge of Morden Bog NNR and Wareham Forest. The scenery was also magical and I have to admit at times it transported me back to road tripping in the American countryside especially when we accidently stumbled into a Haven Resort in the search of one of our heaths. Above: Female Banded Demoiselle Below: Male Banded Demoiselle Above: Ringlet Below: a selection of the scenery which we saw. The final week of the project was now upon us and a return to our usual heath saw us make the suprise discovery that 7595 had re-turned and was sitting in a tree above a busy mountain biking track. We figured out that he was covering an area of around 7 miles between the two sites which is incredible. Hopefully at somepoint we will be able to get his tag back in order to confirm this. Being later on in the month and still hot a another species of Damselfly emerged in the form of the Common Emerald a species which i haven't managed to see for several years. Above: Golden Ringed Dragonfly Below: Male Common Emerald Above: Female Common Emerald Below: Small Red Damselfly Above: 7595 Below: Our Southern Male was now proving rather difficult to find... Above: Large Skipper Below: Female Common Blue Damselfly Above: Male Common Blue Damselfly Below: Female Dartford Warbler Above: Silver Studded Blue Below: Broad-bodied Chaser Now the final day of the project was upon us and we had a special treat in store for us as the evening before Terry had messaged asking if we wanted to head out and ring some chicks on one of the nearby heaths. The answer was obviously a yes. And so on Thursday morning Thomas, Terry, Nick and I headed out onto the heath in order to check one of the nests and fit the chicks with rings. (Please note that the following was all done under BTO Licensing). It was an incredible experience to be able to see the chicks up close. They are quite bizarre at that age and they almost look more like mini dinosaurs than Nightjars. (Pictured Below) After we had finished monitoring the nest I decided to explore the heath. I decided to go and have a look at the small stream that flows through the centre of the heathland and immediately thought to my self that it looked perfect for a Demoiselle. Sure enough within minutes i was watching several Males patrolling the bank waiting for a female to wonder into their territory. What made it more incredible was the fact that they weren't Banded, yep that's right every single one of them were Beautiful Demoiselle. It was an awsome sight and one incredible moment that I will never forget was when one of the Males started to display to a female. It almost hypnotised the female with a sort of peacock like display of his dark helicopter wings. Then the rest was history. It was magical to just watch them and there was something strangely relaxing watching their incredible helicopter displays. Above: Beautiful Demoiselle Below: Fish Sp (Roach?) After this it was time to head back to my flat in order to start packing my suite cases and getting ready to move back home, but not before one last visit to our main heathland.
All i can say is that this has been an incredible experience and one that i will never forget. I have seen some stunning wildlife and had my fair share of wildlife encounters as well as working with an awsome bird in the form of the Nightjar. I would like to thank Both Brian and Terry for running the project and allowing me to take part it has been incredible and at some point in the next month or so I may head back down to Dorset to help out again. Here's to a great summer!
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AuthorI have been a birder since I was 8 however only really started to be able to go out to places by myself in Summer 2016 (Blame the parents) My blogs will be from all over the place, but mainly from RSPB Rainham Marshes and Totteridge Valley! Photography done by Samuel Levy aged 19. ArchivesCategories |