13 Monday Apr 2020
Tags
British birds, house sparrow, nest building, pampas grass, Penarth marina, sparrows nest building
I’ve written before about the House sparrow colony at Penarth Marina. During yesterday’s exercise walk, I noticed they’re now well in to their nest-building chores.
I’m sure the fluffy plumes of the pampas grass seed heads will make a wonderfully soft lining for their nests, and I have visions of tiny naked sparrow chicks snoozing snugly in their cosy warmth.
18 Wednesday Dec 2019
Tags
birding, birdwatching, Black redstart, Blackcap, British birds, overwintering Blackcaps, Penarth marina
What a smashing day I’ve had! I went for a long walk around the outside of Grangemoor Park – it was too squidgy underfoot to walk up the hill (and found some nice blooms for this week’s wildflowerhour), then walked home via the Ely embankment and Penarth Marina.
Amongst the houses at the marina, I spotted a couple of Blackcaps, birds that usually migrate during our winter months (though I did see a male Blackcap in the same area last winter – perhaps the same bird, and one of its offspring – these were both males).
While watching the Blackcaps, I noticed another small bird dotting about on the rooftops behind and was immediately on the alert, because I’ve been keeping an eye out for one of these since the winter began.
I was trying to angle for a better look when it flew above me and on to the roof of a much taller building opposite. The light today was shocking and the bird now distant, three storeys up. I thought I knew what it was but, even using my binoculars, I couldn’t be sure. So, I took lots of photos and hurried home. Once I had the photos on my laptop and was able to crop and lighten them, I was certain – a Black redstart, a bird we don’t often see in my area, though one has visited the marina in winter before. Yay!!!
08 Friday Feb 2019
Posted in 365DaysWildin2019, birds, nature, winter
I took advantage of a two-hour break in Storm Erik’s passage early afternoon to do a quick circuit of the Ely embankment, just in case the storm had driven in any unusual birds. Apart from a lot of Black-headed gulls and Coots taking advantage of the shelter afforded by Penarth’s cliffs and three Redshanks enjoying a companionable snooze, it was fairly quiet. But I did find this gorgeous Cormorant perched on a pontoon in the marina, drying its wings. They’re so often thought of as black-and-white birds but just look at how colourful its facial markings are.
23 Wednesday Jan 2019
Posted in 365DaysWildin2019, birds, nature, plants
Tags
birding, birdwatching, blackbird, blackbird eating berries, British birds, Penarth marina, Pyracantha berries
Four Blackbirds, three males and a female, are currently sharing the colourful and obviously delicious (to Blackbirds) bounty of these Pyracantha bushes in Penarth Marina. Nom, nom, nom!
08 Saturday Dec 2018
Tags
birding, birdwatching, British birds, house sparrow, pampas grass, Penarth marina, sparrow, toetoe
At one end of my regular walk along the embankment of the Ely River where it flows in to Cardiff Bay, near the entrance to Penarth Marina, is a huge stand of what I presume is a type of pampas grass. I always look at it, partly because it reminds me of my New Zealand home (where we would call this by the Maori name Toetoe) and partly because it is often covered in House sparrows.
The birds seem to adore this grass. The sturdy stems provide convenient perches on which to sit and cheep their continuous sparrow conversations, and they pluck away at the fluffy plumes, presumably extracting edible seeds to munch on. And, when threatened by the local ginger-and-white cat, which is frequently to be seen staring hungrily in their direction, the sparrows can easily flit into the dense vegetation of the grass clump to escape the cat’s clutches.
06 Tuesday Mar 2018
Tags
birdwatching, Black redstart, British birds birding, passage migrant, Penarth marina, Phoenicurus ochruros
On the first day of my recent short break in East Sussex, I got a text from a birding friend, checking that I’d seen the news that a female Black redstart (Phoenicurus ochruros) had been seen in the Penarth marina area. As I’m probably one of the few people these days who doesn’t have a smartphone, I was offline throughout my holiday so, no, I hadn’t seen the news, and I just had to cross my fingers that the bird stayed around for a week until my return.
I got lucky! The morning after I got back, I was up and out early, down the hill, bins out and looking. She took a while to find but find her I did.
The Black redstart is a spring and autumn passage migrant and an uncommon winter visitor to Glamorgan, though in recent years birds have been seen in and around the Cardiff Bay area during the winter months. It’s a small bird, about the same size as a Robin, and, as you can see, the female is rather nondescript, mostly grey, with a reddish tail. As she positioned herself on the rooftops so she could spot any passing insects and was almost constantly on the move, my photos are not great but it was a real pleasure to catch up with this little beauty.
