Had a brief meeting today with those concerned with all things WALBOC to discuss methods of improving the site for birds. Progress was made, we have installed a third Barn Owl nest box; set up a better system of nestbox monitoring in Hookwood (there are 50 nestboxes there so it can be tough); arranged a bird-ringing date; decided to get rid of the ridiculous boat that gives people access to top up the nuts in our Hawfinch feeder. That was a bloody pointless boat, our Hawfinch feeder is annually surrounded by water because of the lie of the land but this water is about two feet deep and four feet wide. Yet, for some reason someone decided to build a boat to cross this trickle of water rather than a bridge. It probably won't sound that annoying to you but when you have to get in a boat to cross four feet of water every time you try and see Hawfinch it is a bloody pain in the a***.
Also settled was what to do with the Yellow Marshes. Progress was made. We have decided to drain the pond and widen it substantially. We will remove the reed beds and put in some muddy fringes (that should hopefully attract waders). We will also flood the grass in the area to attract geese and swans and finally we will plant a birch/alder bank that shold attract Redpolls and Siskins in the winter.
Wow, that's more than progress! You're lucky to have such considerate and generous landowners etc. Good on you, mate. I would love to achieve such things with the CFBW Bird Group.
ReplyDeleteIf anything, get yourself a Hawfinch feeder. Not my idea but a brilliant thing to have. Never heard of them elsewhere, but we had no Hawfinch three years ago, set this up and had four within the year.
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