03/11/17 - Wigeon return

With waterfowl numbers now building up in the valley following the first returning flood water, and Wigeon returning from the breeding grounds in Iceland and Eastern Europe, numbers have already reached 3000+. Wigeon are our most numerous wintering bird in the valley, with numbers peaking between January and March (depending on flooding), at around 15,000 birds in recent years. Unlike some of our duck species, Wigeon like to feed on the grasses and herbs of the short sheep-grazed aftermath around the edges of the flooded Ings, where they can fly back to the safety of the open water if disturbed, before quickly swimming back to graze once again. At this time of year the birds will readily come to grain, and so we have been baiting a couple of areas to catch a sample in order to ring them. 233 were caught and ringed at Bank Island last week, which will hopefully help us understand their breeding grounds, migration routes, longevity and site faithfulness, as well as an opportunity to monitor breeding success and the percentage of young in the catches. Many thanks to all the volunteers who make this research and monitoring possible, and to Agrii UK for the kind donation of grain.

30/10/17 - Team work

Over the course of the last few weeks our team of volunteers have been hard at work on the NNR, helping our small team of staff continue with the ongoing management of the reserves, including scrub clearance throughout the site, cutting the Thornton Ellers hay meadow, delivering seed to various sites, and ongoing timber collection from Skipwith Common NNR. Thanks to the efforts from our team, parts of the reserve now have less willows which keep the open landscape for our wintering and breeding birds, whilst improving the views for visiting birders. It was also great to have a helping hand from some members of the York Ornithological Club, with a small team getting stuck into coppicing willows at Wheldrake Ings – many thanks to all involved. 

28/10/17 - Aviva Community Awards

Exciting news - The Friends of the Lower Derwent Valley (FoLDV) have been short listed in the Aviva Community Awards, in a bid to provide scientific equipment to help study the international bird populations of the valley, through ringing and radio/satellite tracking. Not only will this help us to provide suitable management and conditions, but it will also help us delve into the international wanderings and conservation needs on a wider global scale, such as our recent work on Whimbrel, which lead to the production of the children’s book, Winston’s Journey. Not only that, the project is also aimed at engaging local communities, taking the results into schools and working alongside local groups to collect the data – a real community driven project. Having got through the initial rounds, we now need your votes to help secure the funding. Voting is fairly straight forward and only takes a couple of minutes, please click on the link below, register your e-mail address and then add your votes (you’re allowed 10) – all 10 to our project would be fantastic! Please do take the time to vote and please share, forward, retweet and generally spread the word and encourage others to do so – thank you and fingers crossed for a win! https://community-fund.aviva.co.uk/voting/project/view/17-1914

22/10/17 - Helping hand from Agrii

Over the last few weeks we’ve started to get our winter feeding stations up and running around the reserve, to help give our feathered friends a boost as natural food starts to become scarce and the weather begins to turn a little colder. Visitors to the reserve can enjoy the feeding station at Bank Island which is already hosting around 40 Tree Sparrows from our large breeding population in the boxes around the NNR base. There are also good numbers of Goldfinch at the moment – although a flock (or ‘charm’) of 300 are currently present on Wheldrake Ings, feeding on Autumn Hawkbit seed heads, so numbers may increase yet. This year’s grain for both our winter feeding stations and our waterfowl ringing programme has been kindly donated to the Friends of the Lower Derwent Valley by Agrii-UK, based in Pocklington – this will be a huge assistance in supporting the work we do and for which we are most grateful – many thanks to all involved.

19/10/17 - Shieldbug spotting

Last week whilst working on Skipwith Common NNR, we were pleased to still see some of our shieldbug species enjoying the last of the autumn sunshine. A number of Green Shieldbugs were recorded on the birch scrub (first/second photographs), whilst c25 Gorse Shieldbugs were also recorded, along with a single Birch and Spiked on bramble. A quick stop off at North Duffield Carrs on the way back also produced another 6 Spiked Shieldbugs (third photograph) in a small patch of nettles by the Geoff Smith Hide. At the weekend with temperatures soaring to 20 degrees, no doubt many more were out enjoying the warm weather - so keep your eyes peeled on warm sunny days! However on a day like today, they will no doubt have sought refuge somewhere dry!