Otmoor- Brent Goose

Found a dark-bellied Brent Goose on Ashgrave this morning- an Oxfordshire lifer. Also 68 White-fronted Geese and 49 Barnacles amongst 1300+ geese (Canadas and Greylags and an eclectic mix of hybrids) on that single field. I've been keeping an eye on this goose flock and was hoping for Bean or Pink-foot, Brent wasn't on the radar but it should have been! Also Merlin, Hen Harrier, 3 Marsh Harrier and another Otmoor tick- a Nuthatch in the oak copse. Ebird list and some sound recordings HERE

Dark-bellied Brent Goose

Russian White-fronted Geese

Scene out on Ashgrave- got to  be another rare goose before the winter ends or lockdown tightens?

Comparison of White-fronted and Greylag Goose calls from Ashgrave today 

Spent the afternoon on a family walk at Oakley Airfield- the Black Redstart was still there but moved to the Marquee warehouse area and also seemed to be showing a relatively prominent white wing panel today in better light.  I stayed on at the end of the walk to try for owls for an hour or so after dark. No owls but Chinese Water Deer, several Brown Hares, Rabbits, a small mammal (Wood Mouse possibly) and Golden Plovers in the spotlight. 

Black Redstart, Oakley Airfield

 

Black Redstart

Golden Plovers 

Nice to find this first-winter/female- type Black Redstart up on the airfield this morning, another nice little find up there. It's a pretty amazing place, only started keeping an eye on it during the first lockdown and I've had Dotterel, Firecrest, Merlin, Greenland Wheatear, Common Terns, Snipes, Bramblings, a probable Lapland Bunting and discovered breeding Yellow Wagtails, Corn Buntings, Yellowhammers and Grey Partridges and wintering/staging of large numbers of Golden Plovers and Skylarks and passerines. 

Ebird list for today HERE. In addition to the Black Redstart a couple of hundred Golden Plovers, 2 Stonechats, 20 Skylark, 11 Grey Partridge and winter thrushes. 

2021 Developments in Nature Conservation

Here's a few feral thoughts (and comments and discussion) on this week's developments on the world stage (below in de-ranged facebook posts- click on F symbol to view banter) .  What all this means for the global ecological and climate emergency is anyone's guess. So much in flux at the moment in the UK , the new post-Brexit Agriculture and Environment Bills are now taking effect, only time will tell what impact this has on nature conservation but there appears to be a consensus amongst influencers that regulations have been eroded and nature is at greater risk. Whether the project fear predictions of economic and rural collapse ever materialise will soon be seen I guess and whether this results in releasing pressure from the natural system also remains to be seen. We could be entering an era of inadvertent re-wilding created by rural economic collapse?

On the UK front the new changes in the planning system means that democracy is also being eroded with public consultation on specific local planning matters no longer obligatory- presumably making our Hackbridge Neighbourhood Plan  and Forum weaker but the Net Biodiversity Gain framework for those developments might strengthen the implementation of some of our ecological objectives in that plan.  The new environment regulatory body, the Office of Environment Protection (OEP) will need to be adequately funded and what with Natural England already stripped to the financial bone, the enforcement and effectiveness capabilities of that body remain to reveal themselves. Natural Capital Accounting is developing and provides some hope that eventually these new 'eco-economic' indicators will provide a framework for multi-value indices to add support to GDP indicators in measuring 'growth'.

Globally we are expecting COP26 in 2021 also the 2020 (postponed) UN Biodiversity Conference and will see what this means for the ecological and climate emergency and what an independent UK commit to on that. The UK and the world failed to meet any of the 20 'Aichi' biodiversity targets set a decade ago so what value can any of us put on setting these distant global targets?

So we now enter a completely new post-Brexit playing field, with new opportunities, old opportunities no longer available and it's all been pushed through, mercifully away from the spot light which has been directed on the global pandemic.  

What does all this mean for our small organisation, Little Oak Group, is also anyone's guess. What role does small business play in addressing the ecological and climate emergency- I would say that if enough small businesses stepped up to the plate they could certainly achieve a lot more than what NGOs and national or world governments can achieve. 95% of OECD businesses are classified as SME's, they employ 60-70% of the work force. A culture of businesses committed to achieving net biodiversity gain as part of their core business strategy could well be one of the biggest hopes for  nature. That's not something that anyone has to wait to get permission for either from law or policy makers- it something that anyone can volunteer to do, anytime, anywhere in any business. 

Is this how it will go ?? So trump establishes an insurgency and a campaign of terrorism that is never directly linked...

Posted by Peter Alfrey on Saturday, January 9, 2021

I don't think I've ever posted about Trump. Never had much interest until now, where will he go now? He can't just...

Posted by Peter Alfrey on Thursday, January 7, 2021

What the fuck am I watching !!!

Posted by Peter Alfrey on Wednesday, January 6, 2021

Beddington Farmlands, White Stork

 Looks like our White Stork is struggling a bit through this cold spell. 

GB35 is a male who is approximately 3 years old, he originally came to Knepp in 2018 from Warsaw Zoo in Poland after being injured in the wild as a juvenile and rehabilitated. He joined the other storks in one of the satellite pens in East Sussex before being released earlier in 2020. He was seen near Dartford, Kent, on 24th July after spending time near the release site in East Sussex and arrived at Beddington Farmlands in October 2020.

Otmoor, hybrid geese

Got round to having a look at the hybrid geese photos I took at Otmoor recently. The most interesting 'type' is this one below which could well be a Ross's Goose hybrid (about three or four of these types- this one the most striking). Peter Barker (Community Warden) informs me that a Ross's Goose was present for about three years at Otmoor (I saw it a few times- see bottom photo) and it did hybridise with the local geese including both Greylag and Canada.  

What's particularly interesting about these hybrids (if they are Ross's hybrids) is that the parent was a pale morph but it looks like dark morph features are being expressed in the hybrid progeny . 

Ross's Goose (photographed in 2017). Locally nicknamed Francis. A randy bugger by sounds of it. 

Rather than repeat the photos on other posts here a few links with updated comments:

Presumed hybrid Canada x Snow Goose - these might actually even be Ross's x Canada HERE

Goose fest blogs from earlier this week (scroll down or click ) HERE and HERE. 

Otmoor- Grey Plover

Parked up at Beckley today to check out the geese on Ashgrave. Unfortunately no Bean Geese or Pink-foots yet but there is a cold spell with north easterlies on the way so could well shake things up. I counted 54 White-fronted Geese and there were also 41 Barnacle Goose and some more hybrids. Ebird list HERE.

I popped down to check out the passerine feeding area in the hope of a Little Bunting getting amongst the flock but too many people walking through today so I had a quick look at Big Otmoor and finally saw the Grey Plover (Otmoor tick- now 131) which has been around for weeks (just proves what else could be lurking out here amongst the 60,000 birds- there must be a rarity hiding somewhere?) 

Grey Plover (aboves) 

Barnacle and White-fronted Geese on Ashgrave

A couple more hybrid geese (above and below)  - will try and put some names to these when back at the office . Updated 040121- not sure what these are but certainly seems to be Greylag hybrids- potentially Greylag with Ross's or Barnacle? In the picture below it looks a little bit like a Lesser White-front  with the small bill and yellow eye ring.  

I think this is one of the Barnacle x Greylag Geese hybrids. Will need to do some reading but I think there are Greylag x Canada, Barnacle x Greylag, Barnacle x Canada and Canada x Snow Goose amongst these flocks of geese plus what might be second generation hybrids such as the birds in the two photos above showing some more subtle hybrids. 

A beautiful day over the floods and reedbeds

Difficult to get a photo that shows the extent of flood and wetland at the moment at Otmoor but it's enormous- like the English Hortobagy  

New Year's Day Goose Fest

Mixed White-fronted, Barnacle and Greylag Geese

Adult and juvenile White-fronted Geese and adult and juvenile Greylag Geese

Adult White-fronted Goose 

Mixed flock again 

Juvenile White-fronted Goose (above and below) 

Barnacle Goose- counted 39 today 

Also a nice little selection of hybrid geese (above and two photos below). Updated 040121- these (above) are potentially examples of the Ross's Goose hybrids. 

Update 040121: Above and below- these Canada like birds look like they could be Greylag x Canada Goose. Right of the bird below is another presumed hybrid, one of the more subtle ones- with prominent white edges to the tertials, diminutive structure and small bill.  

To add to the variety this domestic -type Greylag Goose was also present 

Fallow Deer( above), Roe Deer (below), Reeve's Muntjac and Brown Hare were also out on the reserve 

A great start to the new year at Otmoor RSPB with Hen Harrier, Merlin, 2 Marsh Tit and 61 White-fronted Geese as the highlights. Ebird list HERE.