01/09/12 - August summary (one to remember!)

Well it has to be said that August will be a month that we will remember for quite some time! As the new month arrived all the excess water started to disappear from the meadows and with that out came all the ducklings that we hadn't been able to see. Suddenly the pools and ditches were full of Shoveler, Gadwall and Tufted Duck ducklings. Several attempts in the ditches and regular goes pushing the corale and checking the duck trap produced the goods with large numbers of Shoveler, Gadwall, Tufted Ducks and Mallard ducklings caught.

 24 Shoveler caught (23 ducklings)

15 Tufted Ducks caught (all ducklings)

17 Gadwall caught (16 ducklings)

The following week three broods of Mute Swans and a pair of non-breeders were ringed, followed by the first swan round up in the valley, with 18 moulting adult birds caught.

39 Mute Swans caught (11 cygnets)

Towards the middle of the month it started to go quiet on the duck front, with just the odd one or two keeping the totals going. Then during the last 10 days of the month it suddenly became all about hand catching wildfowl and mist netting waders! As the water started to drain away Bank Island changed from a pool of water for ducks to a muddy area just right for waders. The catches were far and beyond what we'd hoped for...a new bird for the LDV was caught - a Spotted Redshank, plus only the 3rd and 4th ever Greenshanks, 4 new Common Sandpipers and 5 Green Sandpipers to name a few. More importantly though, 8 Ruff were caught in a single catch and all were colour-ringed, along with 30 Snipe.

30 Snipe caught (all colour-ringed)

Several more attempts at hand catching worked well with 41 Coot caught and 21 Moorhens, bringing the monthly total of wildfowl to 205 (a new August record), which is also our second best month so far this year, with February still holding top spot with 408 caught during the freeze!

41 Coot caught (33 pulli)

Below are the totals for this month plus the years total so far:

                                           August           Year

WATERFOWL
Grey Heron	0		10
Mute Swan	39		44
Greylag Goose	1		8
Brent Goose	0		1
Shelduck	0		78
Wigeon	0		117
Teal	2		292
Mallard	44		366
Garganey	0		1
Shoveler	24		25
Tufted Duck	15		15
Pintail	0		5
Gadwall	17		26
Moorhen	21		40
Coot	41		46
Little Grebe	1		2
WADERS
Whimbrel	0		2
Snipe	30		54
Jack Snipe	0		1
Ruff	8		9
Redshank	0		2
Lapwing	3		6
Oystercatcher	0		2
Ringed Plover	4		4
Dunlin	2		2
Spotted Redshank	1		1
Greenshank	2		2
Green Sandpiper	5		5
Common Sandpiper	4		4
RAPTORS/OWLS
Red Kite	0		1
Tawny Owl	1		16
Little Owl	1		2
Barn Owl	54		94
Kestrel	1		38
OTHERS
Black-headed Gull	1		1