06 Wednesday Feb 2019
Posted in 365DaysWildin2019, birds, nature, trees, winter
Up! Always and forever, the Treecreeper goes up, up, upwards. Never down, hardly ever sideways, though often, in the process of going up, spiralling round and round a trunk, a branch, to the top. And then, flying quickly down to the bottom and heading upwards once again. Unusually, today, this little Treecreeper flew down to the very base of a huge Lime right in front of me and I followed it round and round the tree, until it was too high to see. What a treat!
29 Thursday Mar 2018
Tags
birding, birdwatching, British birds, Chiffchaff, Common frog, Cosmeston, Cosmeston Lakes Country Park, Gadwall, Great Crested Grebe, Hawfinch, Meadow pipit, primrose, Reed buntin, Sand martin, Scaup, treecreeper
11 March This visit to Cosmeston started with me being yaffled at by a Green woodpecker – I always think they’re jeering at me, trying to lure me into stalking them for that ever-elusive close-up. I resisted and walked on, then paused to watch a Magpie trying to carry off a very large twig / small branch, proof that nest-building has begun.
Masses of pale Primroses were flowering prettily along the western boundary path, and the lake was overflowing the boardwalk at the west end due to recent heavy rain.
I paused near there, as I always do, to look at the gulls and finally, FINALLY, spotted the drake Scaup that’s been visiting the Cosmeston lakes on and off in recent weeks, this time in company with a female Tufted duck, which could be why some interesting hybrids are occasionally sighted locally.
I walked up Mile Road and then off the main track to where the bird hide used to be (it was burnt down by vandals last year and has not been rebuilt), and spotted a Treecreeper hopping up a nearby tree, then turned to see a group of five Gadwall on the east lake, much closer in than usual.
I watched them a while then was charmed to also watch a pair of Great crested grebes displaying – more on those here. I wandered on, up Mile Road to the top end where I head back in to suburbia, and was farewelled by a large flock of perhaps fifty Fieldfare and Redwing that flew up from the area of Old Cogan Farm and landed in the trees above me.
16 March I only walked through Cosmeston as part of a longer walk from Sully to Penarth, so I didn’t linger long but I did manage to get closer views and better photos of the Scaup, as it was sitting right off the boardwalk and ‘swan feeding area’ near the cafe. And I also detoured past the dipping pond to check out the Common frog eruption – see more on the frogs here.
19 March I stomped off to Cossie with snow still on the ground (but steadily melting) after the ‘Mini-beast from the east’, the second instalment of cold weather to blast us this month. The most notable wildlife effect was in the large numbers of Meadow pipits to be seen, sometimes in singles, at one point a flock of at least 20 grazing together.
It was also a day of confusing birds: there was a female Blackbird with a pale bib, making me think she might be a Ring ouzel, and two Chiffchaffs pretending to be Reed warblers, presumably because there were more insects to be had close to the water – behaviour also seen at another site in south Wales that day.
And, another sign of spring, I saw my first Sand martins of the year, three of them, hawking back and forth on the east lake.
23 March Once again, this was a walk through rather than around Cosmeston, as I was doing the same walk as a week ago, from Sully back home. As I had recently stocked up on bird seed, I was sprinkling small amounts here and there as I strolled, and was delighted to see three male Reed buntings come down for a snack in one spot – such handsome birds. The other highlight was the Chiffchaffs, at least six crisscrossing the lane between the two lakes, flycatching the multitude of little gnatty things flying about on this sunny day.
29 March Well, I wasn’t intending to make another visit to Cossie this month but then one of my birding friends spotted a Hawfinch there on the 27th and I couldn’t let that pass without at least having a look for it. (For non-birders, Hawfinches are usually difficult to find, though they have been having a good winter this year.) So, trying, somewhat unsuccessfully, to dodge heavy rain showers, I headed over to Cosmeston early this morning. I knew the approximate location to look but it certainly wasn’t easy spotting anything in the dense trees. Luckily, I had listened to the bird’s call on the RSPB website before I set off and that’s how I found it … by listening very very carefully and then following that sound. The bird was very high in a tree and almost obscured by intervening branches (my photo is a heavy crop) … but I was very chuffed to find it!
04 Sunday Mar 2018
Tags
birding, birdwatching, British birds, Buzzard, chaffinch, Cosmeston, Cosmeston Lakes Country Park, Great tit, Lesser redpolls, Malard, nuthatch, Redpoll, Redwing, Reed bunting, treecreeper, Tufted duck
2 February A stride was required so I passed through Cosmeston as part of a longer walk. I did, as always, keep an eye out for unusual birds, though the only bird that fitted that category was a Buzzard in a tree by the dipping pond, exactly where a friend had reported it the previous day.
I scattered some seed around for my small and hungry feathered friends, and I did linger a while by the lake to take some photos of gulls. (I’m attempting to learn to recognise gulls of different ages but I’ll post separately about that when I’ve got more photos and information.)
4 February There are various routes I can take when I walk to Cosmeston; on this day I approached from the north, which produced a couple of Bullfinches near Old Cogan Farm and, further down Mile Road, a couple of Redwing feasting on ivy berries.
To escape the Sunday crowds, I headed off piste and almost immediately spotted a Green woodpecker and, seeing it fly to the ground, started stalking it. It flew off but then a mixed flock of tits and finches flew in, amongst which, to my very great delight, were 3 Lesser redpolls, a bird I’ve only seen once before and which is not often seen in these parts. They were feeding in an alder tree, moving often, doing acrobatics while suspended from cones, flitting from branch to branch, all of which made them difficult to photograph. But what a delightful 30 minutes I spent watching their antics.
9 February I was hoping to spot the Redpolls again today but lucked out, though I did spot a flock of perhaps 8 Redwings in the trees nearby. A handsome male Reed bunting was enjoying the seed a kind passerby had left on a fence post by the west lake, and it wasn’t just me who was finding the winds strong and gusty – this Tufted duck was having a bad hair day.
21 February This was school half-term holiday week in Wales, not a particularly pleasant time to visit a country park to enjoy the delights of nature as the parks are usually full of screaming children and frazzled parents at such times. I managed to avoid most of that by taking the paths less travelled but still found much of the wildlife was being scared away by the noise.
Still, I thought I’d make a list of what I did see: Great tit, Blackbird, Dunnock, Robin, Magpie, Goldfinch, Redwing, Carrion crow, Jay, Wren, Blue tit, Buzzard, Jackdaw, Long-tailed tit, Woodpigeon, Mistle thrush, Chaffinch, House sparrow, Starling, Green woodpecker, Reed bunting, Nuthatch, Coal tit, Coot, Cormorant, Mute swan, Black-headed gull, Lesser black-backed gull, Herring gull, Mallard, Tufted duck, Great crested grebe, Canada goose, Greylag goose and Pochard – not a bad list, with 35 bird species, and just one mammal, the ubiquitous Grey squirrel.
28 February South Wales was feeling the brunt of the ‘Beast from the East’, a freezing weather bomb from Siberia, when I paid my last February visit to Cosmeston so it was a short visit, partly for the exercise and I also bought a couple of bags of seed from the Rangers’ Office to feed the birds. You know they’re finding foraging tough when you see a Treecreeper come to the bird feeder – most unusual! And it was also unusual to have the sparse remnants of the previous day’s snow on the ground, so I had to get a few photos of birds (Chaffinch and Mallard) in snow as well. Let’s hope spring (re)appears soon.
11 Thursday Jan 2018
Tags
bark, bark of trees, Birch bark, properties of bark, Scots pine bark, Sessile oak bark, tree bark, treecreeper, uses of bark
The skin of a tree is an amazing thing but, rather than launch in to a scientific description of its various layers, I thought I’d share just a few examples of its incredible capabilities.
The bark of the Birch tree (Betula sp.) contains good quantities of volatile oils, making it both waterproof and highly resistant to decay – the wood inside rots before the bark does.
The cracks and crevices in the bark of many tree species are great hidey holes for a wide range of small insects that make their homes there.
A good number of insects means a plentiful supply of food for birds like the Treecreeper whose beak can easily probe those hidey holes.
The high levels of toxic tannins in the bark of the Sessile oak (Quercus petraea) help protect it from insects.
The bark of the Scots pine (Pinus sylvestris) is thick enough to protect it from the fires that would occasionally sweep through its forests in prehistoric times.
Bark is also home to huge numbers of different lichen and moss species, many of which have adapted to life on the barks of specific trees.
Some animals eat bark – voles, deer and beavers, for example, and squirrels will strip the fibrous bark of certain trees to make their dreys warm and cosy.
The bark of some trees is fibrous enough to make rope and weave baskets.
07 Thursday Dec 2017
Tags
birding, birdwatching, British birds, bullfinch, dunnock, Forest Farm, Forest Farm Nature Reserve, Great spotted woodpecker, Great tit, Kingfisher, long-tailed tit, Moorhen, robin, treecreeper
I had a meeting at Forest Farm last Friday so, of course, I took the opportunity while I was there to have a wander around the trails and along the Glamorganshire Canal. And it was wonderful, though I did come away feeling a little guilty. We’d had a week of low temperatures, with overnight frosts, and there was a bitterly cold wind blowing. It was obvious the wee birds were cold and hungry but I hadn’t taken any seed with me. Here are a Long-tailed tit, a male Bullfinch, a Dunnock, a Robin and a Great tit.
The water of the canal was sheltered from the breeze and very still, making for some stunning reflections (thank you little Moorhen). And I was treated to excellent views of a female Kingfisher, who sat for at least 15 minutes on her branch. From the way her feathers were fluffed up and she was hunched over her ‘toes’, I figure she was feeling the cold as well.
The Great spotted woodpecker was a treat, as were the Treecreepers – at least four of them, perhaps a family group, were actively scuttling up the branches in one small area by the canal. It was a grand day – my meeting went well and the birding was even better than expected!
13 Sunday Dec 2015
Posted in birds, nature, nature photography
Tags
With its extremely effective mottled brown colouring, the little Eurasian treecreeper (Certhia familiaris) can look very like a mouse as it creeps up a tree trunk searching for food, hence one of its common names, tree mouse. That’s if you can see the treecreeper at all. It’s so well camouflaged that it’s almost impossible to see when stationary, and you need to focus really hard on a tree trunk to notice its scuttling creep upwards in search of the tiny beetles, earwigs and woodlice that inhabit the crevices in a tree’s bark.
The treecreeper has particularly large and sharp arched claws, which help it scale trees with ease, and its tail is stiff, which helps provide support when climbing. You will never see a treecreeper moving down a tree – it spirals its way to the top then flies down to the base of the next tree to start its climb all over again. And this feeding routine is almost constant – in fact, it’s so active that it’s been estimated treecreepers can climb as much as 2500 metres in a single day. That’s quite a feat for a bird that’s only 13cms in length. Its common name should really be mountain climber!
