If you're reading that title and thinking 'aren't we a bit past nest building season at this point?' you'd be right! The nest building happened in early May. But it was so amazing that even though it was over a month ago I couldn't not write about it. I have posts cooking up in my brain about wildlife things that happened years ago. Who knows when they'll get written?
Showing posts with label tracks and signs. Show all posts
Showing posts with label tracks and signs. Show all posts
Tuesday, 9 June 2015
Monday, 14 April 2014
Eggs, Baby Birds and Books
The first baby birds are in our garden! Last Tuesday I was enjoying the newly light evenings and watching the garden when I spotted some wing fluttering and feeding action in one of the trees. A quick look through binoculars showed that this wasn't a male courtship feeding a female, as the bird being fed was reddish-brown and appeared very round because of its fluffed up feathers and almost complete lack of tail. It was a baby, the first one of any species I've seen this year! (The day after I first spotted the Blackbirds, however, I saw the first tiny Mallard duckings in St James's Park!) A closer look showed it had a visible gape, which is the wide, colourful mouth-edge baby birds have in the nest to make their beaks super visible to the parents birds when they come with food. You can see these on all kinds of songbirds.
On a closer look, there were two babies, being attended by the male. One was hunched up and still, and I doubt I would have spotted it if I hadn't seen the male arrive initially, which really shows how quietness and stillness can hide baby birds when their parents are away finding food. The other baby, however, was quite active and was fly-jumping around the tree like anything, it's tiny tail cocked, looking like a giant wren! Interestingly the male visited and fed the still baby three times while I was watching, with the active baby not being fed once, even though at one point it hopped right over to where the male was feeding the first baby and sat there looking expectant. I don't know what's happening there, but I have to say the hopping chick seemed very energetic and healthy so I doubt any long term neglect is happening. Blackbirds are such efficient breeders, they tend to be the first baby birds you see in the spring and starting early means they can often churn out 3 broods in a season, and therefore don't go in for massive clutches, so long-term favouritism in their broods doesn't make sense for them.
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The day after seeing the young Blackbirds, I found these in our drive:
Of course I immediately jumped to the conclusion that they must be the Blackbirds eggshells! But after borrowing my Mum's guide to bird eggs and nests, I found that Blackbird eggs are extremely speckley, and these very pale blue, almost speckle-free eggshells are actually a much better fit for a Starling. This makes sense as Starlings nested under our neighbour's roof tiles last year and we've been seeing them there again. These were actually found surprisingly close to where the nest is, as birds usually take the shells a little distance away to drop them so they don't draw predators to the nest, but at least they weren't directly under it I suppose! I guess here is a possibility it's from Starlings at a completely different site.
This seems a good time to point out the difference between these eggs and the one I found back in January that I guessed had been predated by a corvid. That one had an intact shell except for a big hole in its side. These ones, however, have been cut neatly around the middle! Here's another photo so you can better see what I mean:
Look at those careful, regular cuts! A tiny bird has cut those using its egg tooth while still inside. Regular halves are a sure sign that you are looking at naturally hatched eggshells.
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Forgive the absence of posts recently, I've been working on a costume for an upcoming convention I'm going to! Cosplay and birds are my two passions. :D And I'm also in the middle of a post about a Black-headed Gull colony I sketched at about a month ago, but sketchbook posts take forever to put together and I wanted to talk about baby birds! Have you seen any baby birds yet? If so, tell me all about it!
Now, earlier in the post I mentioned that my Mum has a guide to birds eggs and nests. It's worth mentioning that (as far as I know) you cannot buy these new, because egg collecting has been such a huge thing in the past, it is all kinds of illegal now, but it still happens and the last thing anyone wants to do is encourage it. This is really important, but it can be annoying if you find an eggshell and can't find a book to ID it. My Mum's book was published in the 70s (and was actually published in Czechoslovakia, which I only realised recently and which explains some of the birds included that had puzzled me in the past, like Short-Toed Treecreeper, Crested Lark and Great Reed Warbler, none of which breed in Britain!), and for my last birthday my sister gave me an egg book of my own, which she had found second hand. That, I think, is the best thing to do if you want a book about bird eggs- check second hand shops and stalls, and hopefully you will come across one. Mine is not quite as useful as my Mum's as it limits itself to 'woodland and hill birds', which doesn't appear to include Blackbird or Starling, but it has all the other thrushes, the tits, corvids, pigeons, farmland birds, game birds etc etc so that's all very useful. :) It was also published in Czechoslovakia in the 70s, though the author and illustrator are not the same as my Mum's, which was interesting to spot- maybe loads of bird egg books were coming out of Eastern Europe at the time and being translated? The range of birds is even wider and includes Roller, Nutcracker, Griffin Vulture, Hazel Grouse, Eagle Owl and all that cool stuff! My sister was really on the ball when she bought me that. :D
By the way, though I am a feather collector and have a growing collection of bones (and one deer tail), I wouldn't recommend anyone to collect eggshells because egg collecting is still just too close to home, at least in the UK. Hatched eggshells are very different from ones blown by a collector, but still, I prefer not to go there at all. The ones in my photo were put back outside once I'd photographed them. Bird eggs are beautiful, but they only belong in the wild, and in the UK every single one of them, no matter how common the bird, is protected to the full extent of the law from human intervention. Nests and eggs are more precious than gold.
On a closer look, there were two babies, being attended by the male. One was hunched up and still, and I doubt I would have spotted it if I hadn't seen the male arrive initially, which really shows how quietness and stillness can hide baby birds when their parents are away finding food. The other baby, however, was quite active and was fly-jumping around the tree like anything, it's tiny tail cocked, looking like a giant wren! Interestingly the male visited and fed the still baby three times while I was watching, with the active baby not being fed once, even though at one point it hopped right over to where the male was feeding the first baby and sat there looking expectant. I don't know what's happening there, but I have to say the hopping chick seemed very energetic and healthy so I doubt any long term neglect is happening. Blackbirds are such efficient breeders, they tend to be the first baby birds you see in the spring and starting early means they can often churn out 3 broods in a season, and therefore don't go in for massive clutches, so long-term favouritism in their broods doesn't make sense for them.
**********************************
The day after seeing the young Blackbirds, I found these in our drive:
This seems a good time to point out the difference between these eggs and the one I found back in January that I guessed had been predated by a corvid. That one had an intact shell except for a big hole in its side. These ones, however, have been cut neatly around the middle! Here's another photo so you can better see what I mean:
Look at those careful, regular cuts! A tiny bird has cut those using its egg tooth while still inside. Regular halves are a sure sign that you are looking at naturally hatched eggshells.
**********************************
Forgive the absence of posts recently, I've been working on a costume for an upcoming convention I'm going to! Cosplay and birds are my two passions. :D And I'm also in the middle of a post about a Black-headed Gull colony I sketched at about a month ago, but sketchbook posts take forever to put together and I wanted to talk about baby birds! Have you seen any baby birds yet? If so, tell me all about it!
Now, earlier in the post I mentioned that my Mum has a guide to birds eggs and nests. It's worth mentioning that (as far as I know) you cannot buy these new, because egg collecting has been such a huge thing in the past, it is all kinds of illegal now, but it still happens and the last thing anyone wants to do is encourage it. This is really important, but it can be annoying if you find an eggshell and can't find a book to ID it. My Mum's book was published in the 70s (and was actually published in Czechoslovakia, which I only realised recently and which explains some of the birds included that had puzzled me in the past, like Short-Toed Treecreeper, Crested Lark and Great Reed Warbler, none of which breed in Britain!), and for my last birthday my sister gave me an egg book of my own, which she had found second hand. That, I think, is the best thing to do if you want a book about bird eggs- check second hand shops and stalls, and hopefully you will come across one. Mine is not quite as useful as my Mum's as it limits itself to 'woodland and hill birds', which doesn't appear to include Blackbird or Starling, but it has all the other thrushes, the tits, corvids, pigeons, farmland birds, game birds etc etc so that's all very useful. :) It was also published in Czechoslovakia in the 70s, though the author and illustrator are not the same as my Mum's, which was interesting to spot- maybe loads of bird egg books were coming out of Eastern Europe at the time and being translated? The range of birds is even wider and includes Roller, Nutcracker, Griffin Vulture, Hazel Grouse, Eagle Owl and all that cool stuff! My sister was really on the ball when she bought me that. :D
By the way, though I am a feather collector and have a growing collection of bones (and one deer tail), I wouldn't recommend anyone to collect eggshells because egg collecting is still just too close to home, at least in the UK. Hatched eggshells are very different from ones blown by a collector, but still, I prefer not to go there at all. The ones in my photo were put back outside once I'd photographed them. Bird eggs are beautiful, but they only belong in the wild, and in the UK every single one of them, no matter how common the bird, is protected to the full extent of the law from human intervention. Nests and eggs are more precious than gold.
Thursday, 23 January 2014
Amorous Activities in the Pigeon Family
This is sort of a continuation to my last post about early signs of Spring caused by the mild winter, but only sort of, as hopefully I will show! On a walk about a week ago, I found this:
This is a Woodpigeon's egg, which has been predated. If it had hatched naturally it would have broken into two halves due to the way a baby bird pecks around an egg to escape it using its egg-tooth. And according to my trusty Helm Identification Guide 'Tracks & Signs of the Birds of Britain and Europe', a predator such as a weasel would smash the whole egg up when it ate it. The hole in this otherwise intact eggshell shows that it was predated by a bird, such as a corvid.
The reason I said that this is only sort of a sign of early Spring is that Woodpigeons (and other pigeon species such as Collared Dove) are known to breed at all times of year. They can do this because, unlike most passerines, they can regurgitate food to feed to their babies in a substance known as pigeon milk, meaning as long as there's food for the adults there's food for the babies. Other species of birds, such as Blue Tits, need soft food such as caterpillars and insects for their babies, so they have to breed at the right time of year for that food.
However, weather still matters and I doubt Woodpigeons would have been breeding last January. It was just too cold. And even with this year's mild winter, if this egg hadn't been predated I wouldn't have expected it to survive. Woodpigeons build very basic nests of just a few twigs in a tree, and it's been SO windy and rainy this winter that the nest would have probably blown down.
Speaking of breeding behaviour in the pigeon family, today I was looking out into my garden and saw a pair of Collared Doves start mating! Then, as if that wasn't enough, only a few minutes later there was a pair of Woodpigeons who also began to mate, but this time I got the chance to see a little bit of their courtship too. What first drew my attention was one pigeon began pecking at the beak of the other, and then stuck its beak right inside the other's; it was being fed on pigeon milk! I'd never seen anything like it before. I guessed the one doing the feeding must have been the male, and sure enough when they began to mate it was this bird that jumped on top. Before mating they sort of snuggled up together, with the male puffing up his breast feathers to look bigger.
I've talked about courtship feeding before, and how I've seen females in both Blue Tits and Carrion Crows use a wing-fluttering display to show they want to be fed by the male. The female pecking the male's beak was different though, and reminded me more of the Herring Gull chicks when they pecked their parent's beak on the red pecking spot to get them to regurgitate. Only in the case of the adult Herring Gulls, they were regurgitating a large lump of food onto the ground for the chicks, while the Woodpigeon behaviour I saw suggests that their young take food straight from the parents' beaks. Well, the name 'pigeon milk' does suggest liquid! The male Woodpigeon was showing the female how well he'd be able to feed babies when it came to the time, as well as how well he would feed the female while she was laying and incubating. It looks like more eggs are coming in the future, so let's hope we don't get any more storms!
Woodpigeons are such fascinating birds to watch, especially as you can often observe their behaviour very closely when they are in gardens and parks. We have a ground feeder in our garden and I've noticed how dominant Woodpigeons have a sort of 'lurch forward and wing-flap' gesture that they do to scare off other birds feeding on it. Or at least, it's supposed to! It works on other Woodpigeons and on Collared Doves; they all back off. But Starlings tend to ignore the gesture completely! Starlings may be a good bit smaller than pigeons but they aren't easily intimidated. And perhaps pigeon body language doesn't translate well outside the family?
I hope I'll have the chance to write more about Woodpigeons in the future, because I've seen all kinds of interesting interactions among them. I've seen them squaring up, bowing to each other, standing up as tall as possible, mimicking each other's behaviour...what do these behaviours mean? To guess at that I'd need to watch them more closely, which I plan to do in the future. Since writing this blog I've started watching bird behaviour more closely than ever before, and I feel like I'm finding out new things all the time! As always, please do submit stories of your own about bird behaviour- have you seen any pigeon courtship this winter? If so, leave me comment and tell me all about it! :)
**************************
This is unrelated to pigeons, but on the same walk that I found that eggshell, I saw this:
On the left is a small animal hole (I'd say the photo is about actual size), and in the middle and bottom you can see the shells of seeds. I don't know what species lives here but I'm sure its either a mouse or a vole, as they both eat seeds. Leaving all the seed shells outside reminds me a bit of our hamster, who tends to spit his empty shells outside of his bed! Of course a small animal that lives in a hole doesn't really need to hide its seed shells, as it is safe inside and the hole is so obvious anyway.
**************************
And finally, and back on the pigeons, here's a slightly disturbing pop cultural reference to pigeon milk! I'm a big fan of the game series Animal Crossing, in which there's a pigeon character named the Brewster who owns a coffee shop. After you get to know him a bit, he offers you some pigeon milk to put in your coffee. Um........:O
Someone in this game's development had a sense of humour alright!
...But as you can see from the picture, in the game your character seems to really enjoy the pigeon milk-infused coffee. So I guess it's not so bad!
This is a Woodpigeon's egg, which has been predated. If it had hatched naturally it would have broken into two halves due to the way a baby bird pecks around an egg to escape it using its egg-tooth. And according to my trusty Helm Identification Guide 'Tracks & Signs of the Birds of Britain and Europe', a predator such as a weasel would smash the whole egg up when it ate it. The hole in this otherwise intact eggshell shows that it was predated by a bird, such as a corvid.
The reason I said that this is only sort of a sign of early Spring is that Woodpigeons (and other pigeon species such as Collared Dove) are known to breed at all times of year. They can do this because, unlike most passerines, they can regurgitate food to feed to their babies in a substance known as pigeon milk, meaning as long as there's food for the adults there's food for the babies. Other species of birds, such as Blue Tits, need soft food such as caterpillars and insects for their babies, so they have to breed at the right time of year for that food.
However, weather still matters and I doubt Woodpigeons would have been breeding last January. It was just too cold. And even with this year's mild winter, if this egg hadn't been predated I wouldn't have expected it to survive. Woodpigeons build very basic nests of just a few twigs in a tree, and it's been SO windy and rainy this winter that the nest would have probably blown down.
Speaking of breeding behaviour in the pigeon family, today I was looking out into my garden and saw a pair of Collared Doves start mating! Then, as if that wasn't enough, only a few minutes later there was a pair of Woodpigeons who also began to mate, but this time I got the chance to see a little bit of their courtship too. What first drew my attention was one pigeon began pecking at the beak of the other, and then stuck its beak right inside the other's; it was being fed on pigeon milk! I'd never seen anything like it before. I guessed the one doing the feeding must have been the male, and sure enough when they began to mate it was this bird that jumped on top. Before mating they sort of snuggled up together, with the male puffing up his breast feathers to look bigger.
I've talked about courtship feeding before, and how I've seen females in both Blue Tits and Carrion Crows use a wing-fluttering display to show they want to be fed by the male. The female pecking the male's beak was different though, and reminded me more of the Herring Gull chicks when they pecked their parent's beak on the red pecking spot to get them to regurgitate. Only in the case of the adult Herring Gulls, they were regurgitating a large lump of food onto the ground for the chicks, while the Woodpigeon behaviour I saw suggests that their young take food straight from the parents' beaks. Well, the name 'pigeon milk' does suggest liquid! The male Woodpigeon was showing the female how well he'd be able to feed babies when it came to the time, as well as how well he would feed the female while she was laying and incubating. It looks like more eggs are coming in the future, so let's hope we don't get any more storms!
Woodpigeons are such fascinating birds to watch, especially as you can often observe their behaviour very closely when they are in gardens and parks. We have a ground feeder in our garden and I've noticed how dominant Woodpigeons have a sort of 'lurch forward and wing-flap' gesture that they do to scare off other birds feeding on it. Or at least, it's supposed to! It works on other Woodpigeons and on Collared Doves; they all back off. But Starlings tend to ignore the gesture completely! Starlings may be a good bit smaller than pigeons but they aren't easily intimidated. And perhaps pigeon body language doesn't translate well outside the family?
I hope I'll have the chance to write more about Woodpigeons in the future, because I've seen all kinds of interesting interactions among them. I've seen them squaring up, bowing to each other, standing up as tall as possible, mimicking each other's behaviour...what do these behaviours mean? To guess at that I'd need to watch them more closely, which I plan to do in the future. Since writing this blog I've started watching bird behaviour more closely than ever before, and I feel like I'm finding out new things all the time! As always, please do submit stories of your own about bird behaviour- have you seen any pigeon courtship this winter? If so, leave me comment and tell me all about it! :)
**************************
This is unrelated to pigeons, but on the same walk that I found that eggshell, I saw this:
On the left is a small animal hole (I'd say the photo is about actual size), and in the middle and bottom you can see the shells of seeds. I don't know what species lives here but I'm sure its either a mouse or a vole, as they both eat seeds. Leaving all the seed shells outside reminds me a bit of our hamster, who tends to spit his empty shells outside of his bed! Of course a small animal that lives in a hole doesn't really need to hide its seed shells, as it is safe inside and the hole is so obvious anyway.
**************************
And finally, and back on the pigeons, here's a slightly disturbing pop cultural reference to pigeon milk! I'm a big fan of the game series Animal Crossing, in which there's a pigeon character named the Brewster who owns a coffee shop. After you get to know him a bit, he offers you some pigeon milk to put in your coffee. Um........:O
Someone in this game's development had a sense of humour alright!
 |
| Source: http://soapboxview.blogspot.co.uk/2013/08/the-animal-crossing-new-leaf-photo-post.html |
...But as you can see from the picture, in the game your character seems to really enjoy the pigeon milk-infused coffee. So I guess it's not so bad!
Thursday, 3 October 2013
Non-bird nature in Crab Wood
Last Sunday I took a trip down to Crab Wood, an area of
ancient woodland that is managed traditionally using coppicing (and named after
its crab apple trees!). I’ve been birdwatching there for a few years now, but this year visiting has
yielded few birds, especially as I keep visiting at quiet times for birds, like
early autumn and mid-winter, when I’ve found the birds tend to be quiet. I never got around to going during the
breeding season this year! Oh well, next
time.
The birds may have been quiet, but that didn’t mean there
was nothing to see by any means. The
damp, autumnal weather had caused fungi to burst out all over the place,
ranging from tiny, weeny mushrooms on the thinnest stalks, to huge brackets
growing out of the ground, each one more than a foot across. I don’t know much about fungi at all, but
there were two species present I could confidently identify: the first were the
puffballs, little round balls growing out of the ground. Some were unripe, but others when nudged with
my foot released puffs of powdery spores.
There’s no need to feel guilty for squashing a puffball with your foot,
all a ripe puffball wants is to be stepped on so its spores will be
spread! And they pop back into shape
straight away, anyway.
The second one I knew was the one I believe is called
something like King Alfred’s Cakes, which is a black, burnt-looking, roundish
blob that grows on dead or alive wood.
It’s named after a legend of King Alfred being asked to look after
somebody’s cakes and neglecting them so that they burned...and there’s probably
more to the legend than that, but I couldn’t tell you, I’m afraid! Though I should really know, as I’m from
Winchester and King Alfred was the ancient King of Wessex, and there’s a statue
of him right in the town. ^^ Anyway, the strangest thing about these fungi is
they are quite flammable. I remember
back when I was a kid and was a member of Wildlife Watch, the local Wildlife
Trust’s children’s group, one of the leaders lit one on fire to show us how it
burned. It’s absolutely fascinating, as
you’d think of most fungi being quite moist to the touch, like a mushroom. I didn’t go around touching the fungi at Crab
Wood as I didn’t want to damage them, or get my hands gooey and/or poison-y
(!!) but wouldn’t it be interesting if the King Alfred’s Cakes were dry and
hard? Anyone know?
The rest of the fungi was a complete mystery to me, but
there was such a variety of shapes, sizes, textures and colours that I really,
really wished I’d remembered to bring my camera! Sadly I didn’t, so instead I will describe
some of the other types I remember seeing:
- huge, wavy, light brown brackets growing out of the ground in a group- Edit (22/11/13) After some research I have IDed these as Giant Polypore!
- small, orange squiggles on tree- Edit (22/11/13): Wrinkled Crust is a possibility, though not sure any more.
- red and gooey looking, growing alone in a cleft at the base of a dead tree;
- bronze-black with rounded caps;
- small and white with thick stems;
- tiny, with long, very thin stems;
- a single, brown bracket growing on a tree with a texture like a bread roll;
- a group of brown brackets with white borders;
- small and pink, some with grooves around the edges, some without;
- a single, large bracket which had coated the area around it with white spores.
My favourite of all, though, was a ball-shaped fungi I found
on the ground that was covered all over in small, soft spines. It was like a sweet-chestnut shell, though
more the size of a conker shell, or like a tiny hedgehog that had rolled into a
ball. I gave it a gentle nudge with my
foot and found it was attached to the ground with some sort of stalk, though
you couldn’t see one among the leaf litter.
There were several around the area, of a range of sizes but mostly
smaller than a conker shell, but I didn’t see any more in the whole of the
wood. Fungi seem to be strange that way!
My dad has a book about fungi which I borrowed when I got
home, hoping to identify some of the fungi I’d seen, but because I didn’t have
photos the only one I was able to indentify was the spiny ball. It’s called a Spiny Puffball, which
presumably means it’s a relative of the puffballs I’d seen earlier in the
visit, but a gently nudge didn’t make it release any pores so maybe it works
differently from those puffballs? (I
also found out the species name for the bursting puffballs: Soft Puffball.)
As for other wildlife, I was pleased to find...another
badger sett!! I’ve found setts before,
but never one in Crab Wood, and in fact didn’t know there were any badgers
there. It’s not near any of the main
paths, and it was only by exploring some of the smaller paths that go deeper
into the trees that I found it. Like the
other sett I know about, there were several holes in a relatively small area,
and the top was covered in loose earth, but this time there were impressively
sized lumps of chalk in the earth as well- it must be hard work removing them,
but the badgers were clearly equal to the task!
I didn’t find any dung this time, or badger hairs, but there was
a large piece of dead tree lying over the sett and it was covered in dozens of
sets of scratch marks, no doubt from the huge digging claws the inhabitants of
the sett all boast. That was a new thing
to see!
On my way out of the wood, I came across another species I’d
never seen in the wood before: hornets. There
was a long crack in the bark of a tree, and hornets were flying in and out all
the time. They were at least the size of
a queen wasp, and I used to think hornets just looked like big wasps, but
actually their markings are different.
They are less obviously stripy than wasps, and instead most of their
abdomen is shiny yellow, with a little maroon on their heads and sides. Another striking thing I noticed about them
was that they didn’t come straight over to investigate me, as wasps tend
to. I really hate the way wasps get in
your face, but the hornets couldn’t care less about me watching them,
concentrating instead on what they were doing inside the tree. And they didn’t buzz at all. Their nests are big papery structures like a
wasp’s nest, and the crack in the tree certainly wasn’t like that, so maybe
they are going to overwinter in the tree.
Does anyone know how hornets spend the winter: do they all die except
the queen like wasps, or do more of them overwinter? I’d be fascinated to know!
Also, one important thing to remember if you encounter
hornets: they may be bigger than wasps, but their sting is no worse! It is good to think of that if you see any of
these massive beasties. ^^
Saturday, 20 July 2013
Recording signs of mammals for the National Mammal Atlas
Note: This post contains photos of dead animals and poo. Just a heads up in case you're eating your dinner!
At the start of this month I was in Wales, and when I came back I was determined to write about the wildlife...but I have epic writer's block on that post. So to try and shift it, here's a post about looking for mammals!
Recently I became aware of the National Mammal Atlas, a project by the Mammal Society to try and map the distribution of every British mammal species, and being someone who loves recording records online (I already submit to Birdtrack, BTO's garden bird count, goingbirding.co.uk, and seasonal counts such as the Big Garden Birdwatch and the Big Butterfly Count) I was very interested in the project. They want every single record, from rare species to common ones like Rabbit, Brown Rat and Grey Squirrel. As well as reports of living mammals they accept reports of dead animals, meaning roadkill can be a useful record, and they want records of signs of mammals, such as burrows, droppings, footprints or mole hills. As a birdwatcher I sometimes see mammals, but if I'm lucky I might see two species in one trip. So I decided to go on a walk and see how many signs of animals I could find.
Since the weather has been gorgeous recently I decided to go to a good place for butterflies, Stockbridge Down, and sure enough the place was alive with them: Meadow Brown, Gatekeeper, the lovely Marbled White, the tiny Small Heath and the cute, bright orange Small Skipper. Best of all was the large, lurid orange fast-flying Dark Green Fritillary. The Down is also fantastic for birds, and though it's getting to a quiet time of year for songbirds there was still plenty to see, including a male Blackcap popping in and out a tree with beakfuls of food, a blindingly yellow male Yellowhammer singing from the top of a bush, and a flock of 5 or 6 Mistle Thrushes (maybe a family?) flying by.
But what about the mammals? By the time I arrived at the Down I unfortunately already had records for two species from the drive over. I say unfortunately because of course they were roadkill: a Grey Squirrel about halfway through the journey, and rather heartbreakingly, a Badger, very close to the entrance to the Down. I've never seen a living Badger before (though I have found signs of them) and I hate seeing them dead on the roads. Then I had barely stepped through the gate of the nature reserve before I found a third mammal, a Common Shrew. This is another animal I've never seen alive, despite it being incredibly common in Britain; I expect it's probably nocturnal like a lot of small rodents. This, of course, is why records of dead animals are useful to the Mammal Society- otherwise they'd end up with far more comprehensive records for diurnal animals than nocturnal animals. Anyway, here's a picture of the Shrew.
At the start of this month I was in Wales, and when I came back I was determined to write about the wildlife...but I have epic writer's block on that post. So to try and shift it, here's a post about looking for mammals!
Recently I became aware of the National Mammal Atlas, a project by the Mammal Society to try and map the distribution of every British mammal species, and being someone who loves recording records online (I already submit to Birdtrack, BTO's garden bird count, goingbirding.co.uk, and seasonal counts such as the Big Garden Birdwatch and the Big Butterfly Count) I was very interested in the project. They want every single record, from rare species to common ones like Rabbit, Brown Rat and Grey Squirrel. As well as reports of living mammals they accept reports of dead animals, meaning roadkill can be a useful record, and they want records of signs of mammals, such as burrows, droppings, footprints or mole hills. As a birdwatcher I sometimes see mammals, but if I'm lucky I might see two species in one trip. So I decided to go on a walk and see how many signs of animals I could find.
Since the weather has been gorgeous recently I decided to go to a good place for butterflies, Stockbridge Down, and sure enough the place was alive with them: Meadow Brown, Gatekeeper, the lovely Marbled White, the tiny Small Heath and the cute, bright orange Small Skipper. Best of all was the large, lurid orange fast-flying Dark Green Fritillary. The Down is also fantastic for birds, and though it's getting to a quiet time of year for songbirds there was still plenty to see, including a male Blackcap popping in and out a tree with beakfuls of food, a blindingly yellow male Yellowhammer singing from the top of a bush, and a flock of 5 or 6 Mistle Thrushes (maybe a family?) flying by.
But what about the mammals? By the time I arrived at the Down I unfortunately already had records for two species from the drive over. I say unfortunately because of course they were roadkill: a Grey Squirrel about halfway through the journey, and rather heartbreakingly, a Badger, very close to the entrance to the Down. I've never seen a living Badger before (though I have found signs of them) and I hate seeing them dead on the roads. Then I had barely stepped through the gate of the nature reserve before I found a third mammal, a Common Shrew. This is another animal I've never seen alive, despite it being incredibly common in Britain; I expect it's probably nocturnal like a lot of small rodents. This, of course, is why records of dead animals are useful to the Mammal Society- otherwise they'd end up with far more comprehensive records for diurnal animals than nocturnal animals. Anyway, here's a picture of the Shrew.
Poor little thing. Ask anyone: I have a soft spot for small furry creatures. ^^ You can tell this is a shrew by its very pointy nose (unlike the rounded nose of a vole) and its hairy tail (unlike the bald tail of a mouse) that is short compared with the body. Finally, the teeth of a shrew are tipped with red, as you can see in this close-up:
I would love to find out why the teeth are red, so if anyone knows, let me know.
As for how I know this is a Common Shrew and not one of the other kinds, I confess it was mostly process of elimination: the Common Shrew is far more numerous and therefore it is most likely to be one. The fur colour (warm brown rather than dark grey) and size (about the size of a mouse rather than smaller) also helped me come to this conclusion.
How it died is a bit of a mystery to me, as being killed by a predator would seem the most likely cause of death, but why would the predator then leave its kill? But then on the Mammal Society information page on Common Shrews, I found this: 'They are often found abandoned by the predator..since
a liquid produced from glands on the skin is foul tasting.' So that seemed plausible. And in the first photo you can see what looks like it might be the fatal wound, on the back of the Shrew's neck, which is where a predator would bite to kill its prey.
As I continued my walk, I found mole hills, and burrows covered with rabbit droppings, as well as the only living mammal I saw on my walk: a lone, alert-looking rabbit! Rabbit droppings are easy to identify, but later on I found some poo that caused a bit more confusion.
As you can hopefully see in the close-up, these droppings are packed with beetle shells, which made me think 'Badger!' straight away. The reason for that is I remember when I was a Wildlife Explore (young RSPB member) we found some poo like that on a field trip, and the leaders said it was Badger poo. I did a little research all the same, and then began to be unsure, because I found out that Badgers make latrines near their setts and that's where most of their dung will go. This was found out on the grass, not in a latrine and nowhere near a sett, so I started to look for suggestions for alternative possibilities online. It seems that beetle shells can be found in Hedgehog dung, but to rule that one out size is the main factor, and though I didn't measure the droppings (must bring a ruler next time!) compared with the size of a Hedgehog, I think they were far too big. Domestic dog can be ruled out immediately because the poo didn't smell, and dogs don't tend to eat loads of beetles. Same with sheep, which do graze on part of the Down, but they certainly don't eat beetles. Fox poo can also be ruled out because that has a peppery, pungent smell (I've had the dubious pleasure of finding Fox poo before) which this didn't have at all.
So for a while I was unsure about what I had found here, until I noticed something else which you should be able to see in the close-up: there's some long, white hairs stuck to the droppings! I'm almost sure they are Badger hairs, and I already know Badgers are in the area (thanks to my sad find near the entrance of the reserve earlier) so I've reported this to the Mammal Atlas as a field sign of Badgers. Just in case, though, I've attached a photo so the record can be checked. I did the same for the Common Shrew, though not for the mole hills or dead squirrel, those are pretty easy even for a mammal novice such as myself. ^^
The best thing about trying this experiment out was realising how much I might normally miss: if I wasn't thinking about looking for mammals, I might not even have noticed the shrew or the Badger droppings, or the mole hills, which even though they are a common sight, are a sure sign that an animal barely anyone ever sees is present in the area! So, although I only saw that one Rabbit, I also found Badger, Mole and Common Shrew, as well as that squirrel on the journey, and therefore had 5 species to submit to the Atlas. And I learned some new things about Common Shrew and Badgers!
To anyone who wants to submit your own results, follow this link: http://www.mammal.org.uk/ and go to 'submit records' on the left. You can submit any mammals you have seen in Britain since 2000, as long as you know the date and the location you saw it, which you pinpoint on a map. When doing this, it helped me to remember whereabouts the animal was found in relation to a landmark: for example, the dead squirrel was on the road near the entrance to Sparsholt College, so that made it easier to find on the map. At some point I want to go back and submit some mammals I've seen in the past.
Hopefully Wales post will be up next! Because I really did see some awesome things there...
Friday, 26 April 2013
Badger Mysteries
Today I went up to one of my patches, Farley Mount, where there's a path
that runs along next to some farmland. In the winter the field was covered in
flocks of Chaffinches, Yellowhammers, Skylarks and Fieldfares, but now spring
is finally underway the flocks have gone, though a couple of chaffinches were
calling and a lark was singing. There weren't many birds around, but I went
down to check on the badger's sett I found on my last visit.
When I originally found the sett I was following a trail of feathers- I'd found some Red-Legged Partridge body feathers at the edge of the path, probably the remains of a kill, and followed the trail into the bushes where I found a couple of tail feathers from the partridge. But then I noticed that the whole area was completely strewn with feathers from a male pheasant, which are very recognisable because the body feathers are so bright and colourful, and the tail feathers so long. The feathers were strewn over the many entrances of a badger set, with some of the tail feathers leading down into the entrances, and the wings, still intact, were lying next to each other nearby.
I was baffled because I just couldn't imagine a badger being able to catch and kill a pheasant. I had always understood that badgers mostly eat invertebrates, roots, berries and small mammals, and a quick google search of what they eat also mentions reptiles and amphibians, but not birds. I wondered if the pheasant had been injured, been found dead by the badger or just been unlucky enough to walk into its mouth (seeing as pheasants aren't very clever). I also wondered if another animal, like a fox, had killed the pheasant and eaten it, and it just happened to be over the badger's set, or maybe a badger had stolen the kill from a fox. The feathers were all snapped off at the ends as if a mammal had removed them, so I ruled out a bird of prey kill.
When I returned today there was the scattered feathers of another pheasant, this time a female, on top of the set, and it seemed just too unlikely that any of those explanations could have happened twice. Now I’m sure a badger must have been the one to eat the bird, as the set is definitely occupied- there are various signs of this, like little hollows in the earth which badgers make with their snouts when they forage, some dung in a little scraping of earth, and a place where a lot of white hairs lay around, where I imagine the animal might have had a good scratch. But the question is, could a badger catch and kill a pheasant? They may not be great flyers, but they are large for an animal that usually only hunts small mammals, and fast runners too.
Wikipedia, that oracle of not-properly-moderated information, says: ‘Badgers typically eat prey on the spot, and rarely transport it to their setts’, so that adds another confusing element, and suggests the birds must have been caught or found right above the sett. Wikipedia also says ‘Surplus killing has been observed in chicken coops’, which I hadn’t heard of, but if badgers can kill poultry that suggests they could kill pheasants, which are about the same size, though the pheasant would still need to be caught first.
But perhaps another element needs to be taken into account in this puzzle. Near the remains of the pheasant were shotgun cartridge cases. The shooting season for pheasants is closed, and anyway people shooting pheasants would usually take the body, but...if someone was shooting illegally, just for the hell of it, would they bother? Maybe they didn’t have a dog to retrieve the body, and couldn’t find it in the bushes? Maybe the pheasants were shot very near the sett, and the abandoned kills were found by the badger? That’s one explanation I could think of. It may be incredibly far off, but the shotgun cartridges did make me wonder.
If anyone knows anything about badgers killing or eating gamebirds, please do let me know! I really don’t know much about badgers, and this is the first time I’ve ever seen an occupied sett, and I’ve never seen a badger in the wild. I’m hoping to find a badger footprint in the area- it’s hard to see any in the loose earth around the sett, but I will keep looking because badgers have really interesting pawmarks, according to my book of animal tracks and signs (it’s a kids one- I really have only just got back into looking for signs of animals recently, so I haven’t thought much about this type of wildlife watching since I was really young. But the book is still useful for simple stuff like this. Not so useful for finding out Who Killed the Pheasant!).
I took a few of the female pheasant feathers for my collection, and I’m starting to get a good idea of what female pheasant body feathers look like, which will help for future IDing- it’s always good to be able to rule out pheasant when you’re looking at body feathers! Also the wing and tail feathers are so, so beautiful with their 3 tone barring- might be tempted to do a painting!
I also found a couple of vertebrae in the area. I have no idea at all whether these belonged to the pheasant, or something completely different, and I don’t know how I would ever find out, but they were very clean bones and I happened to have a plastic sandwich bag on me (in case of finding feathers! I go prepared when I go out these days. I used to put found feathers in my wallet ^^) so I took them home, and they are now the first ever bones in what I’m sure will be a small and hopefully not too disgusting collection! I’d love to collect bones more but I rarely ever find them, and when I do I never have a bag on me and I don’t really like carrying them around without using bags. Mind you from now on I will keep my eyes open for more, though I will probably stick to clean bones only for the time being. I didn’t see any other bones in the area that might provide ID clues, but the vertebra are I’d guess about 1cm in length, not counting the two pointy bits that goddammit I can’t remember the name for! What on earth was biology A-level for again? Anyway the ‘pointy parts’ are about 1cm long themselves. And there’s a lovely hole for the spinal cord. (vain attempt to sound technical again- seriously if anyone knows what the pointy parts are called let me know! One of my aims in making this blog is to learn things from more knowledgeable people. Also if I make a natural history mistake please do let me know!) I will take a photo soon and upload it, if I remember.
The field next to the path, where all the birds were feeding in winter, held a couple of Red-Legged Partridges, and it's also very good for hares- I’ve only visited this area three times counting today, but there have been hares there every time and today did not disappoint, with a single big brown hare all hunched up in that classic hare pose, with the ears over the back. They always seem to be sitting like that when I see them in this field, right out in the open and they never have the nervous, alert twitchiness rabbits always seem to have. Though I’m sure, like all wild animals, they are fully aware of any predators that might come from any direction. On my way back up the path I looked for the hare again, but it and the partridges had disappeared, no doubt because of a Buzzard that was soaring overhead!
One last thing of interest: a flock of at least 6 Jays flew over while I was walking back. Flocks of Jays are not something I usually ever see, but I did once see at least 7 together last October, when there was an influx of Jays from the Continent. Maybe the same thing is happening but in reverse?
When I originally found the sett I was following a trail of feathers- I'd found some Red-Legged Partridge body feathers at the edge of the path, probably the remains of a kill, and followed the trail into the bushes where I found a couple of tail feathers from the partridge. But then I noticed that the whole area was completely strewn with feathers from a male pheasant, which are very recognisable because the body feathers are so bright and colourful, and the tail feathers so long. The feathers were strewn over the many entrances of a badger set, with some of the tail feathers leading down into the entrances, and the wings, still intact, were lying next to each other nearby.
I was baffled because I just couldn't imagine a badger being able to catch and kill a pheasant. I had always understood that badgers mostly eat invertebrates, roots, berries and small mammals, and a quick google search of what they eat also mentions reptiles and amphibians, but not birds. I wondered if the pheasant had been injured, been found dead by the badger or just been unlucky enough to walk into its mouth (seeing as pheasants aren't very clever). I also wondered if another animal, like a fox, had killed the pheasant and eaten it, and it just happened to be over the badger's set, or maybe a badger had stolen the kill from a fox. The feathers were all snapped off at the ends as if a mammal had removed them, so I ruled out a bird of prey kill.
When I returned today there was the scattered feathers of another pheasant, this time a female, on top of the set, and it seemed just too unlikely that any of those explanations could have happened twice. Now I’m sure a badger must have been the one to eat the bird, as the set is definitely occupied- there are various signs of this, like little hollows in the earth which badgers make with their snouts when they forage, some dung in a little scraping of earth, and a place where a lot of white hairs lay around, where I imagine the animal might have had a good scratch. But the question is, could a badger catch and kill a pheasant? They may not be great flyers, but they are large for an animal that usually only hunts small mammals, and fast runners too.
Wikipedia, that oracle of not-properly-moderated information, says: ‘Badgers typically eat prey on the spot, and rarely transport it to their setts’, so that adds another confusing element, and suggests the birds must have been caught or found right above the sett. Wikipedia also says ‘Surplus killing has been observed in chicken coops’, which I hadn’t heard of, but if badgers can kill poultry that suggests they could kill pheasants, which are about the same size, though the pheasant would still need to be caught first.
But perhaps another element needs to be taken into account in this puzzle. Near the remains of the pheasant were shotgun cartridge cases. The shooting season for pheasants is closed, and anyway people shooting pheasants would usually take the body, but...if someone was shooting illegally, just for the hell of it, would they bother? Maybe they didn’t have a dog to retrieve the body, and couldn’t find it in the bushes? Maybe the pheasants were shot very near the sett, and the abandoned kills were found by the badger? That’s one explanation I could think of. It may be incredibly far off, but the shotgun cartridges did make me wonder.
If anyone knows anything about badgers killing or eating gamebirds, please do let me know! I really don’t know much about badgers, and this is the first time I’ve ever seen an occupied sett, and I’ve never seen a badger in the wild. I’m hoping to find a badger footprint in the area- it’s hard to see any in the loose earth around the sett, but I will keep looking because badgers have really interesting pawmarks, according to my book of animal tracks and signs (it’s a kids one- I really have only just got back into looking for signs of animals recently, so I haven’t thought much about this type of wildlife watching since I was really young. But the book is still useful for simple stuff like this. Not so useful for finding out Who Killed the Pheasant!).
I took a few of the female pheasant feathers for my collection, and I’m starting to get a good idea of what female pheasant body feathers look like, which will help for future IDing- it’s always good to be able to rule out pheasant when you’re looking at body feathers! Also the wing and tail feathers are so, so beautiful with their 3 tone barring- might be tempted to do a painting!
I also found a couple of vertebrae in the area. I have no idea at all whether these belonged to the pheasant, or something completely different, and I don’t know how I would ever find out, but they were very clean bones and I happened to have a plastic sandwich bag on me (in case of finding feathers! I go prepared when I go out these days. I used to put found feathers in my wallet ^^) so I took them home, and they are now the first ever bones in what I’m sure will be a small and hopefully not too disgusting collection! I’d love to collect bones more but I rarely ever find them, and when I do I never have a bag on me and I don’t really like carrying them around without using bags. Mind you from now on I will keep my eyes open for more, though I will probably stick to clean bones only for the time being. I didn’t see any other bones in the area that might provide ID clues, but the vertebra are I’d guess about 1cm in length, not counting the two pointy bits that goddammit I can’t remember the name for! What on earth was biology A-level for again? Anyway the ‘pointy parts’ are about 1cm long themselves. And there’s a lovely hole for the spinal cord. (vain attempt to sound technical again- seriously if anyone knows what the pointy parts are called let me know! One of my aims in making this blog is to learn things from more knowledgeable people. Also if I make a natural history mistake please do let me know!) I will take a photo soon and upload it, if I remember.
The field next to the path, where all the birds were feeding in winter, held a couple of Red-Legged Partridges, and it's also very good for hares- I’ve only visited this area three times counting today, but there have been hares there every time and today did not disappoint, with a single big brown hare all hunched up in that classic hare pose, with the ears over the back. They always seem to be sitting like that when I see them in this field, right out in the open and they never have the nervous, alert twitchiness rabbits always seem to have. Though I’m sure, like all wild animals, they are fully aware of any predators that might come from any direction. On my way back up the path I looked for the hare again, but it and the partridges had disappeared, no doubt because of a Buzzard that was soaring overhead!
One last thing of interest: a flock of at least 6 Jays flew over while I was walking back. Flocks of Jays are not something I usually ever see, but I did once see at least 7 together last October, when there was an influx of Jays from the Continent. Maybe the same thing is happening but in reverse?
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