Category Archives: birds

The entertainer

23 Saturday Oct 2021

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A Black redstart was reported from Cardiff Bay barrage so off I stomped to try to find it. Despite much searching, scanning with my bins, and walking back and forth, I failed to find it (I was somewhat gratified to learn later that more experienced birders had also not found it). But there was a small bonus, in the form of this delightful Stonechat.

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It was very active, flitting frequently between shrubs and rocks and back again, quarrelling with one of the resident Rock pipits, and being told off by a stroppy Robin. Luckily for me, in the middle of this flurry of activity it came to rest quite close to where I was standing and I managed to get a few nice photos. It was very entertaining!

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Shoveler

16 Saturday Oct 2021

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The highlight of yesterday’s stomp around Cardiff Bay was this male Shoveler quite close to the boardwalk at the wetlands reserve.

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He was standing on a submerged log, body up out of the water, so he could preen. As you can see, he was looking a bit scruffy, only part way through the moult to winter plumage (shown below in a photo taken in December a couple of years ago), and was mostly still wearing his breeding colours. He was having a good scratch and preening with that large beak, shedding several feathers during the time I watched him.

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Iridescent Starlings

13 Wednesday Oct 2021

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Wire-dotter, pylon-swarmer, dusk-dancer, aerial-clinger … these are just some of author and poet Rob Cowen’s descriptions of these shimmering birds, the Starlings, in his poem ‘Starling’ from his recently published book The Heeding (Elliott and Johnson, London, 2021). I’m not a great reader of poetry but this work is magical, and includes the stunning illustrations of Nick Hayes – I highly recommend their work.

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And Starlings are also magical: musicians that entertain with their broad repertoire of trills and whistles, flutes and warbles; murmuraters that fly en masse with remarkable precision; fashionistas that dazzle with the greens, purples and blues of their iridescent plumage.

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The return of the Ring-necked duck

07 Thursday Oct 2021

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Many local birders, including our county bird recorder, seem to agree that this Ring-necked duck is the same bird that spent much of last winter in Cardiff Bay in the company of the large Tufted duck flock. She appears to have remained in the company of those ducks over the summer and now returned with them to over-winter in the Bay and on other local lakes and reservoirs. Long may she linger!

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Humbug

05 Tuesday Oct 2021

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It seems late in the season to be seeing a juvenile Great crested grebe that’s still constantly nagging its parent for food and still sporting the head stripes that have earned these birds the nickname ‘Humbug’ (for those unfamiliar with the word, it’s a black-and-white-striped boiled sweet) but there are still a couple in my area.

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I presume these juveniles are the result of second breeding attempts by the adult birds after their first attempts have failed. Their parents may not agree but I think they’re incredibly cute!

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Confiding Wheatear

01 Friday Oct 2021

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During a recent circuit of Cardiff Bay, I spent a wonderful 30 minutes with this very confiding Wheatear.

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Though it was naturally very wary of the noisy people and dogs passing by, as I was quiet and non-threatening it allowed me to get quite close.

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As I watched, it went scurrying across the grass after flying insects, dipping and flashing the white under-tail feathers it’s named for, constantly checking the sky for signs of danger.

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And I particularly loved how, when there was no higher object to pop up on, it hopped on to a small rock to try to survey its surroundings. Magical moments with a special little bird!

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Little egret

16 Thursday Sep 2021

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I don’t walk around Cardiff Bay often during the summer months as I dislike the crowds and the clutter of event equipment, choke on the smell of the herbicides the Council uses to kill off the real wildflowers to create artificial ‘wildflower meadows’, and fear for the safety of the birds when blasted by jetboating thrill seekers. Fortunately, the coming of the cooler weather brings some relief from much of that human activity and so I begin again to explore the Bay.

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And, on my very first walk along the Barrage in some time, I got lucky: a Little egret was standing in amongst the crowd of gulls on one of the floating platforms by the locks. At one point the gulls chased off the intruder but, after a short circuit of the Barrage, it and they returned to the platforms. Little egrets are relatively common birds in Britain now but are not seen often in Cardiff Bay, so this was a very welcome 2021 patch tick for me.

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Migrating Reed warbler

11 Saturday Sep 2021

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As is often the case with this little brown bird, I heard it before I saw it, not the song but the short nasal ‘churring’ call these warblers make to keep in touch with each other deep within the reed beds.

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Luckily for me, as this particularly Reed warbler foraged its way along the brook, I could follow its movement by the bending and shaking of reed stems, and when it occasionally ventured out to the edge of the reeds, I was able to grab some images.

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Small though it is – around 13cm in length, the Reed warbler (Acrocephalus scirpaceus) migrates from Britain to over-winter in sub-Saharan Africa, so this little bird has quite the journey ahead of it.

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Return of the Great tits

08 Wednesday Sep 2021

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It’s so lovely to see the little birds out and about again, recovered from the strain of raising at least one, probably more, brood(s) of chicks, and looking spick and span in their newly moulted plumage.

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When I was bimbling about in the woods last week, I was visited by a number of Great tits, checking out what I was doing, looking for any insects I might have disturbed. It was a delight!