Whiteford Field Trip

An update from Bruce

I have now sorted out details of the Whiteford Field Trip with Steve Bolchover which will take place at 10am on Saturday 9th June, starting at Cwm Ivy car park near Llanmadoc, Gower. Steve is an expert on beetles and is the county recorder for them.

As he lives on Gower he knows the area well. This is an opportunity for those with little knowledge of Coleoptera to learn some basics and professionals will also find Steve's knowledge informative.

We could see the rare Dune Tiger Beetle photographed in 2012 at Whiteford - see photo.

it is bound to be a grand day out as we would say in Yorkshire... please make every effort to join us

Regards
Andy

Big Welsh Coastal Walk - Information

We received this information from the Ramblers that we thought may be of interest

The Big Welsh Coastal Walk is celebrating the launch of the Wales Coast Path on 5th May, 870 miles of footpath covering the whole nation’s coastline.

The big event is happening all over Wales on the bank holiday weekend of the 5th, 6th & 7th May and we are encouraging as many people as possible to get involved. So far we have over 50 walks taking place all around Wales and 3 official launch events.

To join the walks people need to go to the google map on our website – www.ramblers.org.uk/wales where they can find out what is going on, click on the icons and then contact the walk leaders directly.

Individuals can also sign up through our homepage to get more details, and find free coastal path maps on through the CCW site – www.walescoastpath.gov.uk.

Three official events are also taking place in Cardiff, Aberystwyth and Flint, provisionally from 11am-5pm with the official opening of the path by Welsh ministers.

We hope the walks can be an opportunity to highlight the magnificent coastline of Wales and the fantastic walking available.

Bittern & Water Rail

Recently been trying my hand at bird photography, and been very lucky to get the attached images of two shy birds. The Bittern was at Forest Farm and the first Bittern I'd ever seen, however I have now seen it on two subsequent visits.

The Water Rail was taken at Slimbridge, I'd checked their website the evening before my visit and read that Rails were showing well at a particular hide, and they were right!

Bittern at Forest Farm

Not a CNS sighting, but something reported by and photographed by one of our blog followers

There is a nice write up and some excellent pictures on Jeremy Inglis's photo blog

http://jeremyinglisphotography.blogspot.com/2012/03/bittern-at-forest-farm.html

Regards
Andy

Effects of Autochthonous and Allochthonous Primary Production on the Diversity of Invertebrate Feeding Guilds in a River Ecosystem

We are pleased to be able to tell you that the Cardiff Naturalists' Bioscience prize awarded at Cardiff University in honour of Professor Ursula Henriques the 2012 Prize has been awarded to Zigmunds Orlovskis.  Zigmunds is a student from Latvia, and he is an outstanding recipient of the prize.  He was awarded the top mark for his field course report.

Zigmunds being presented with the cheque and certificate by 

Chris Franks, President of the Society

Zigmunds went on a freshwater biology fieldcourse to France.  His project was entitled "Effects of Autochthonous and Allochthonous Primary Production on the Diversity of Invertebrate Feeding Guilds in a River Ecosystem", although he came up with a more user friendly title for the CNS talk!

Zigmunds in very keen on Natural History and has been on a Cardiff Naturalists' outing! which we are very pleased to hear because this prize is intended to encourage the widest possible interest in the natural world and also build a relationship with the student body

After  the presentation he entertained the members with a fascinating presentation with some excellent information, pictures and videos. Once again a real credit to the quality of work that can be produced by a person with real enthusiasm for his subject



Full Details of the award and information about Professor Henriques can be found Here

Frogs and Toads

Feb. 16th:  Frogs spawning in our pond.  Saw about 24 frogs and 22 blobs of frogspawn.  The next day I counted 32 blobs.

Feb. 26th:  Attempted another count and found at least 110 blobs.

March 3rd:  Spawn very difficult to see by this time but at least 120 blobs.  Thought I saw a few frogs still spawning but on closer inspection found they were toads - at least 20 and numerous strings of toadspawn.  There were toads crawling and mating all over the place, the smaller males clinging to the backs of the females while other males tried to dislodge them.  The strings were impossible to count, wrapped as they were around pond plants.

March 5th:  More toads spawning.  Counted 6 pairs mating and a couple of lonely males!

Parasites of The Eurasian Otter

Ellie Sherrard-Smith gave us a fascinating insight into the parasites that effect Otters and what they can tell us about their lives and distribution patterns, Not one for the squeamish tonight with some views if lice being a bit closer than I like to be where they are concerned, but fascinating all the same

This was another presentation from the excellent work that is being done by the Cardiff Otter project team and