Cardiff Birdwatch

Report by Mike Dean

About 12 intrepid bird watchers met at the north end of Roath Park Lake on Sunday, January 10th 2016. Conditions were far from ideal as it was raining and very wet underfoot from the rain the night before. We first walked around the woods to the north of the lake and then around the lake itself but by the time we returned to the cars, heavy rain and hail commenced so it was decided not to move on to a second location but to return to the comfort of our homes.

However, we were able to see some notable birds, namely – a Great Spotted Woodpecker, Long Tailed Tits, Redwings together with the usual residents of the wood all to the accompaniment of a Song Thrush. On the lake we saw a Pochard, Little Grebes, Tufted Ducks together with the Mute Swans, Coots, Moorhens & Mallards.

Thanks must be given to Linda & Rob Nottage for organising the event in spite of the inclement conditions.

 

 

Bute Park Goings on

Here are two photos from Bute Park from one of our members (Jane Williams)

The first is an excellent picture of Autumn cobwebs in Pontcanna Fields

The next an intriguing Wooden Woodpecker in Bute Park.itself

It can be found in the "wild" part of the woodland on the river side of the field adjoining the ambulance station... just up from Blackweir, but you'll need to look carefully

Some recent bnews from the park is that the dippers are busy around Blackweir - previously they nested in the banks of the feeder canal but last year they settled inside the fish pass where they produced young. Jane comments "Luckily we didn't have any heavy rain and floods to flush them out - but I hope they don't do it again this year, they might not be so lucky"

Something for your diary. The Friends of Bute Park are running events in the Education Centre in Bute Park on Saturday 28 January - Big Garden Bird Watch Day. There will be bird spotting forays, quizzes and the RSPB will be there setting out their stall, and making bird boxes and fat feeders.

Building stones walk date

If you have not yet read it in the newsletter or seen it on the website we can now confirm that the Cardiff bay Building stones walk is now set as

Thursday 11th August 2011 starting at 18:30 

Meet at the junction of Bute Street and James Street

Click on the location information below to see a map of the starting point

Coryton Orchid in Flower

Regarding the post made recently about the unusual orchid at Coryton roundabout I made a return visit to see if the mystery orchid had flowered this lunch time and here it is in it's full glory. 

It is indeed looking like " Common Spotted Orchid Var.rhodochila" ! 

Rhian

Mutant Foxglove

Hi all,

thought you may be interested in the attached photograph. It's the top flower of a Foxglove spike in our garden .In fact we have three other Foxglove plants in the garden all showing the same aberration.

Anyone out there have any ideas as to the cause?

A Whole Summer of Wildlife Fun Coming up

Now is a good time to be checking the website for the updates to the programme that have been made and making sure that all of our events are in your diary

Once again Bruce Mcdonald is doing a massively good job in arranging a whole summer of wildlife orientated entertainment with a host of events that are suitable for all ages and levels of experience

To make things easier the recent updates are given here, but to make sure it's all in your diary we really do suggest taking a look at the programme, or event better print out a copy of the programme and share it with your friends or print out a copy of the membership form and send us a an application so you make sure you are kept up to date with our programme
  

Sat	16	July	10:00	F	Parc Bryn Bach	340 acres of mixed grass, woodland and lake near Tredegar in the company of a local ranger	Rangers
Thur	28	July	18:30	F	Hailey Park	An evening walk with some sweep nets to see what insects we can find along with flowers and trees	Members
Wed/Thu	10 or 11	August	18:30	F	Cardiff Bay Building Stones	An evening stroll around Cardiff Bay looking at building stones and their geology. Date still to be finalised - please check the blog for details	Lynda Garfield and Dave Wellings

if you are interested in any of the events, but not already a member we are happy to have you join us for a trial.

If you have any questions please do not hesitate to contact us via the details given on the website

RHS Show

I thought this year’s RHS Show in Cardiff (8-10 April) was the best yet, after my visit on Friday. It had expanded to include two floral marquees, the show gardens and farmers’ market area, bandstand and “café quarter”. Among the show gardens was Cardiff Council Ranger Service’s lovingly recreated road side verge (below) complete with tyre tracks and some litter to highlight the biodiversity of such habitats. The National Museum Wales stall featured a pot of 7 dandelion species – all found in the same Cardiff garden. There are well over 200 species of dandelion in the UK and, if the diagram showing the characteristics to look for is anything to go by they are not easily distinguished. The National Botanic Garden of Wales had information on Barcode Wales, a biodiversity project to identify unique DNA sequences for the entire native flora of Wales, which was the subject of a recent Cardiff Naturalists Society talk.

Otters in Cardiff

We were pleased to receive this email from one of our members (Pauline Peregrine) recently who took a walk in Easrern Cardiff

"I don't know if you keep records of sightings - but would like to tell you that we saw an otter in the River Rhymney yesterday!  Clearly, I don't want to be too specific on the location for obvious reasons!  We were delighted to see the Otter - closest sighting we've ever had!"

The simple answer is yes we do like to keep records especially of unusual sightings and we would love to tell you about more of them here so we encourage people to let us know and also possibly record them directly with SEWBrec via their recording form at http://sewbrec.org.uk/recording-form.page

We know that the SEWBrec team keep in touch with information from the society so if you prefer to just tell us that's not problem

In the event of finding a dead otter, please telephone 08708 506506 (Environment Agency) and ask for your nearest conservation / biodiversity officer. You will be asked for the location of the otter and some other basic information.

The Cardiff Otter project investigate dead otters to determine cause of death and how that relates to their lifestyles. You can read more about such at the Cardiff Otter project website http://www.otterproject.cf.ac.uk/

Regards

Andy