Lovely surprise to start the summer

May 8, 2016
We had a minor maintenance day with six of our trusty volunteers on the Home Reserve at Rochdale today; and were cleaning out one of the ponds used by the migratory and resident birds.

With the wonderful song of the swallows all around - quite how they have such energy having flown all the way from North Africa is beyond me! They really are the acrobats of the skies.

The whole reserve is alive with birds just now, with the flies now plentiful, we have cut right back on the seed feeding stations. Many blackbirds and thrushes have young in the nests, and several more species such as the sparrows, jackdaws, and moorhen and mallards are busy building their nests or incubating their eggs

It was while clearing the drain we came across a trio of newts; all in great health and I managed to get a photo of one before all three were returned back to the water. These are the Common Newt, and I was pleased to see the ponds so well-stocked with wildlife.

We have been given a lot of nest-boxes in kit form following my earlier appeal, and John Thorpe has offered to build them up for us. We will get these installed throughout the reserve over the next week or so, in order they can be in use for this year and give our tit / finch / robin families a helping hand.

Nigel

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