Third Time Lucky?

In 2013 the rangers of Hackney Parks and Green Spaces pollarded a tree in which had a Little Owl occupying one of its hollow branches. The Little Owl could be regularly viewed from the WaterWorks NR Pitch & Putt.

Back in the day:  https://archive.is/20130626053801/theleevalleyparkbirder.blogspot.co.uk/2013/03/walthamstow-and-waterworks-nature.html#selection-1065.0-1065.89

https://archive.is/theleevalleyparkbirder.blogspot.co.uk

A year 2 child’s dad (in the class I was teaching at the time) worked for HPGS and after I had mentioned what had happened, HPGS had me design a nest box which they put it up in the pollarded tree. 

The nest box was mostly occupied by squirrels and stock doves for 6 years. But yesterday, Eugene Dillon-Hooper tweeted (with photos https://tinyurl.com/rzmx9fj ) that he had spotted a Little Owl on the platform of the nest box. Eugene later confirmed that Mike Messenger spotted the Little Owl earlier on New Years Day.

Fantastic and well done Mike and Eugene!

I paid a visit to the WaterWorks NR today and after a bit of searching the nest box tree (whilst 3 Treecreepers creeped, sang and called around the trees near me), a Little Owl was found in the pollarded tree to the left of the nest box tree. It called several times. The HPGS nest box was placed facing south. However, the original branch and its hole in which a Little Owl used to look out of, faced north. And today, a Little Owl was in a natural tree hollow, facing north. Maybe it doesn’t like the box or prefers facing north or is keeping an eye on the banks of the old river lee for small mammals?

On the same Feb 2013 day, before watching my last WaterWorks NR Little Owl, I also had a Bittern in the WaterWorks NR: https://archive.is/cn2m9

Fingers crossed!

PS. A Little Owl tree had also been pollarded on the Walthamstow Marshes SSSI paddocks a few years prior to the WaterWorks NR pollarding. Lets hope at a third time of asking, a Little Owl can get a few good years of solid me time in its desired tree (however, there are a lot more parakeets around the waterworks these days and a 'doggy beach swimming club' very near the Little Owl tree: https://tinyurl.com/yx78u74l).

Pics, Vidz and eBird links from today:

Little Owl

Treecreeper

WaterWorks NR eBird numbers: https://ebird.org/checklist/S63035716

Graham

2^nd January 2019

 Walthamstow Marshes SSSI & WaterWorks NR

50 species combined

Male and Female Stonechat on marshes boardwalk.

ebird numbers for Marshes:

https://ebird.org/view/checklist/S51204007?share=true

Goldcrest in Horseshoe Thicket

ebird numbers for WaterWorks:

https://ebird.org/view/checklist/S51204791

 

Shoveler in WaterWorks

The Patch on eBird (& Why do so few birders use eBird?)

Why do so few birders use eBird?

What is eBird?

eBird is the world’s largest biodiversity-related citizen science project, with more than 100 million bird sightings contributed each year by eBirders around the world.

https://ebird.org/home

With a few minutes spent on the mobile phone app, birders can record their sightings and their data would contribute to this. Many birders spend time blogging or tweeting about their latest escapades in the field, so why not put the sightings to conservation use on eBird?

Walthamstow on eBird

eBird is a useful tool.

To give eBird a patch watching context, Walthamstow Reservoirs is the 3^rd top London ‘Hotspot’ for number of species recorded and Walthamstow Marshes is the 9^th.

The WaterWorks NR appears in the top 30 under the guise of ‘Leyton Marsh & WaterWorks.’ But then Leyton Marsh is part of Walthamstow Marshes, so that’s a bit messy. The WaterWorks NR itself comes in at London number 34:

Bird blogging or tweeting, at its best, informs another birder or wildlife enthusiast of wildlife news or shares where and when to view wildlife; at its worst, it is someone’s holiday photos or latest tick (somewhere in between does a bird blog or tweet lay).

With eBird, there is no question of its usefulness. An eBird report can contribute to graphs, data and trends for the patchworker or conservationist. For example:

January to December Observations of Waterfowl on Walthamstow Marshes 1900 - 2018

Northern Wheatear Observations on Walthamstow Marshes 1900 - 2018

This is a link to London's eBird data (find your patch from here):

https://ebird.org/region/GB-ENG-LND/hotspots?yr=all&m=

So, why do so few birders use eBird?