Wagtail reflections

Under a leaden sky, a grey spring day, what better time to reflect on past adventures? I spent the summer of 2011 volunteering with the Hellenic Ornithological Society at Gialova. Happy memories of watching harriers from the roof of a long abandoned fish farm as the sun rose, of the first crowd of flamingos, landing on the lagoon the day after the first rains. Lying floating in the warm millpond-calm Mediterranean sea while Plain Tiger butterflies (Danaus chrysippus) flew over me, perhaps on some hazardous migration to North Africa, not dissimilar to their American cousings the Monarchs (Danaus plexippus.) Drinking in a bar with some of the gentlest people I have ever met, from every corner of Europe and beyond, united by a shared love of nature and nature conservation. One of my finest memories from this time, as summer turned to autumn and the hillsides turned from brown to green with the rains, was of the swallow roost. Hirundines, mostly barn swallows but with a few Sand Martin and Red-rumped swallows, would gather over the water, pursuing the mosquitoes over the surface, the winged cavalry as far as us much-bitten volunteers were concerned.  In their hundreds they wheeled and swooped below the sunset. They would gather in the vast phragmites swamp, chattering and squabbling for space, occasionally slipping awkwardly down the stems. Sometimes they would form a visible column, a dense stack of birds circling and descending, creating the impression of a column of smoke. Then, as if someone had turned out the lights, silence, as the birds settled down for the night. As the season progressed into October, and the chills of autumn truly began to set in, the numbers of these little birds began to drop off as they continued their journey, which, in the case of H. rustica, spans the breadth of two continents. But the reedbeds were not vacant, and the place of the swallows was taken by a different species, a wintering one, which arrived in small flocks, but nontheless gathered in density. These were the continental subspecies of a familiar bird, the White Wagtail, Motacilla alba alba, and it was with their gentle chirping that the reed beds now rang. Busy little birds, in the daytime they were rarely seen away from hard surfaces, the articficial paths across the lagoon, the small visitors' car park, with their curious running gait and low, fast flight. They too roosted among the phragmites, and by the end of october appeared to outnumber swallows.    
 
In winter, it is well known that the centre of Upminster is populated largely by their British conspecifics, pied wagtails, M. alba yarrelli. Yesterday I counted 30 gathered in numbers on the open greenery of Upminster Park. One wonders what such a species did before the built environment came and gave them a home.  They roost in numbers in one or two trees in the town centre, as they do in trees in urban heat islands across the country, little white powderpuffs clining to the branches as streams of commuters pass by. They remained still and silent when my partner and I looked up into the branches one cold evening a few weeks ago. No commuters stopped to see what had caught our attention, just a man and a small child who stopped, the father showing his daughter the tree full of little birds. There must have been fifty of them in the tree, and by day no-one would know they were there but for the white droppings on the ground beneath. Another tree across the road was similarly bedecked. As we watched the birds became restless, and we walked slowly away, knowing that wildlife spectacles first encountered on exotic shores can be experienced right here on the urban fringe. 

Warley Place

Well, after several minutes subjecting the 'pootah to all manner of expletives while trying to restore my google account to life, I think I may as well post on the damn thing. I've spent an enjoyable afternoon wandering round the lovely Essex Wildlife Trust reserve at Warley Place with the Matriarch, and Warley Place seems as good a place to start blogging as any. It's covered in crocuses and snowdrops, and as we walked up the trail as the sunshine faded to grey clouds, I enjoyed pointing my camera at the floral displays there. A single bird of prey, I assume it to be a buzzard, past low over our heads, and we found ourselves staring at a difficult back view as it flew low over the adjoining farmland. The woodland is beginning to come to life as we stand on the cusp of a new season. The great tits were on full and typically repetitive song, and familiar but charming long-tailed tits fluttered about in the trees above us. We wandered on and found a goldcrest in a rhododendron near the walled garden. Goldcrests are fantastic birds to watch, constantly moving, flitting between buds and pecking at them, little avian mice, their apparant energy dictated by the demands of a tiny body and a fast metabolism. They have big, dark eyes, and look at you head on, with mild concern, before continuing with their urgent quest for small insects to eat. A yellow badger stripe runs down their foreheads. One afforded us better views as it alighted in a bare tree, not pausing for more than a second or two. Not uncommon but a charmer, and the smallest bird one regularly sees in these parts. I swifty passed the binoculars to mumsy so she could have a look at the charming avian mouse, as more long-tailed tits flew past us.
The common birds were in evidence, with chaffinches and robins offering us their chorus, and the gutteral, dinosaur-like squawks of a Jay made us stop and look up, as we approached the bank which, come April, will be covered in a sea of bluebells. The pretty corvid with the blood-curdling voice flew over us among the oaks. In the trees I spotted something small, a little bigger than a sparrow, clinging to a heavy bough. It was a species which Warley Place seems particularly good for, the Nuthatch. Nuthatches aren't rare, but they are not common in suburban South Essex either. Their smart uniform of blue grey over rusty pale makes them one of the most attractive, to my mind, denziens of the woodland canopy. It is birds like this which make such sites so special.
At the North hide we watched a few great and blue tits hanging on the peanut feeders and doing their thing, until a furry interloper, a grey squirrel, furtively walked up and after a few cautious glances around, climbed up the pole with the feeder mounted on it and chased everything off. A nyger seed feeder had been ripped open, presumably by this very beast, or at least one of its comrades, proving that the seeds, said to appeal to goldfinches but in my garden attracting absolutely nothing, are eaten by at least one woodland creature.
As the sun set we looked between the ancient oaks and down on a view from which we could see Canary Wharf tower and the Shard, monstrosities making it impossible to escape the sense of place, and the fact that we remained within the urban fringe.
It was an ordinary, sunny afternoon, and we hadn't seen any rare birds, but nontheless it was pleasant to be out among nature, walking through the crumbled remains of the old stately home and its gardens which once occupied the site, before the trees and the birds took back what was theirs.
And it was the visit to start a blog with. So there you go.