Summary July 2013
Garden
July has turned out to be an absolutely scorching month with record temperatures and virtually no rain – the opposite of the first months of the year. We were away on holiday until the 12th and when we came back the garden was like a jungle. As regards birds, we are still seeing some Swifts flying above but we do not see the Mistle thrushes anymore. Finches are almost completely absent and the only garden bird we see regularly are the Blackbirds that come daily to eat and bathe. It is had to tell exactly how many there are since they only even come in pairs. Apart from the bird table the other feeders are hardly touched and the odd Blue Tit or Goldfinch make very little impact on them – a most strange year in the garden. Some rain arrived on the last few days of the month with summer thunder storms and sudden heavy downpours but, even then, the temperature remained warm and was sunny between the downpours.
Some good news is that, whilst not foolproof, out cat scaring device seems to be working and we see far fewer cats in the garden now.
Holiday Birding
We went to the Azores for ten days but really they are only good for birds in the migration seasons and not in Summer. Nonetheless we did see some good birds. We saw Azorean Buzzards a few times and on one occasion we actually saw about sixteen of them all together high up in the sky wheeling around each other. We also had fantastic views of hundreds of Cory’s Shearwaters on a daytime boat trip between the islands of Faial and Pico. Apart from that it was a multitude of Blackbirds, Spanish Sparrows, Rock Doves and Chaffinches We saw the odd Goldfinch and Greenfinches were fairly common but we did not see Goldcrests which are supposed to be reasonably frequent. On the other hand we had not gone there for the birding so we were not expecting much and we were quite content with the Cory’s Shearwater and the Azorean Buzzards – “two life ticks”.
Birding Group
There were no birding group days this month.
Birding Days Out
Just before we went of holiday we had gone to the Woolston Eyes Reserve Open Day and we returned for a visit on our own to Woolston Eyes Reserve on the 16th July a little after we got back from our holidays. It was a blisteringly warm day so I think that a lot of the woodland birds were lying low but it was a good walk and we had more great views of the Black-necked Grebes and their many young – many, interestingly, at various stages of development and some juveniles already happily feeding on their own. We also saw rather younger birds being fed by a parent which was very cute. This was followed by a fantastic lunch at Aiden Byrne’s Church Green Bar and Restaurant at Lymm Dam.
On the 18th and 19th we went to Wales. We drove from Manchester to Conwy where we stopped at RSPB Conwy for a cup of tea and a bite to eat before heading off to RSPB South Stack. at Anglesey where we at last got a chance to catch up on some of the seabirds that we had so far missed this year. We didn’t see any Kittiwakes, Fulmars or Choughs but we did see some Puffins and plenty of Guillemots and Razorbills. We even managed to see a small group of Black Guillemots at the Fish Dock at Holyhead. From there we went to Cemlyn Bay to see the Tern Colony and had a great time watching Arctic Terns feed their young just a few feet from us on the shingle at the waters edge. We stayed overnight at Bulkely Arms Hotel in Beaumaris and the following day we went to the Spinnies at Abergowen near Tal-y-Bont where we saw a nice flock of Goosanders and lots of Oystercatchers and a couple of dozen Little Egrets. We rounded off our trip with a visit to RSPB Conwy where we had a spot of lunch and spent quite some time looking for a Green Sandpiper that we just could not find.
In the Sandpiper department we had a lot more luck on the 26th July when we went out for the day to Burton Mere Wetlands where we saw not one but four – Green Sandpipers and also a Single Wood Sandpiper – two year ticks. We also had fabulous views of a Sedge Warbler singing loudly from a Cow Parley stem.