The Night(s) of the Owl - A loud report...

Perhaps more of a damp squib....

This last weekend... centred on Saturday the 23rd.... was designed to focus peoples attention on the Owls of France....
and especially the plight of the Barn Owl and the Chevêche d'Athéna [or Little Owl]... both of which are in steep decline...
from destruction of habitat, especially the "bocage" [see below]...
and the modernisation of old buildings, without thought for former inhabitants [or because of a dislike of them]...
and on the roads from our "need for speed"!

There was almost no mention of either at the events we attended...
but there most probably was at Tony Williams' talk on the Friday...
which we we were too late in booking...
"Desolé, complét!"

Saturday, we drove over to Benais, in fine, sunny weather, for their afternoon/evening event...
but we weren't intending to stay for the evening walks.

It started at 3.15...
and we were there...
to be welcomed through the door with another couple...
and a gran with three "kids for the afternoon"....

and as things were still being set up...
we watched a lot of these arrive at 3.05!....

for the time we were there... about an hour...
we were outnumbered by the volunteers!
A great shame really as there was some very good stuff...
as usual at these events, aimed squarely at the kids.
But there was also a film which was showing, "Les Nuits de la Dame Blanche"...
one of five short natural history films by Laurent Charbonnier ...
somewhat old now, but excellent as it showed the life cycle of the owl and ancient beliefs...
[like nailing a corpse to your barn door to ward off evil]...
and the bocage habitat that it likes to hunt.

There was also "Owl Pellet Dissection" for the kids...
and a booklet [ for this event, reference only... nothing for sale]...
from the CPN's collection of Cahiers Techniques... "Pelotes! Décortiquer et déterminer"...
an excellent booklet [available from the LPO Boutique at 8€]...
the key for identification of remains was simple and well illustrated...
and knocked all previous keys I've come across into a cocked hat.

 

 

And includes full instructions on methods of sterilising the pellets...
Pauline's not to pleased!!

There were three kids... gran's bunch... well occupied at this...
and a couple of brave volunteers had had their faces painted... as owls.
As well as a wonderful display of photographs of owls... each of the main species.

The event at Benais was well publicised in the Nouvelle Republique, our local paper...
with a more than quarter-page colour article in the Weekend section...
but... possibly too late?

We headed back after about an hour,  via Bourgueil and a vintner we buy from... 

Degustation... Chez Bourdin.

then back across country to Saint-Maure to try and find Hercules l'Ognion... but found him not...
but the Bricomarché was selling Turbo, another onion that we like. [A very good keeper!]...
it was here that I discovered my hat missing...
it was late, we'd had a gentle drive looking at the country...
change up a gear..
a hell for leather drive via the A10 and A85 back to Bourgueil ensued...
good for the Gaspode...
it will have blown the cobwebs out [and I discovered that the tyres need balancing]...
Pauline telephoned the Vinter en-route...
hat not there!

Arrived back at Benais...
lots more cars... probably for the walks...
but still not many.
Yes... my hat was there...

Hat Found!

but when I looked at it, it was minus one badge...

Badge missing!!

a difficult badge to remove, too.

The missing badge was my RSPB members badge...
[there was no YOC in those days... you were a member!]...
a present, along with membership, a secondhand but good pair of binos and my first bird book, from my parents in 1958...
there were other badges on the hat that were more "attractive" and easier to remove...
no...
leaving rather a sour taste in my mouth, it had to have been an LPO member!
Someone who knew the significance of RSPB!
Apologies to the LPO... the badge had not gone missing... it was on another hat!!


Shame really...
we are, or should be, aiming at the same thing...
it will be replaced by an LPO badge.
I'd worn it on something...
mainly hats... I've had many...
since '58.
Impossible to obtain a real replacement...
in 1960, they changed the design to a blue one with the avocet on it...
and mine was prior to that, when there were still relatively few members...
the 10,000 barrier was passed in 1960 and the Avocet symbol only started being used in late 1955.

---oooOOO000@000OOOooo---

Bocage describes a region where small fields and meadows are enclosed by earth banks carrying hedges or rows of trees and where the habitation is generally dispersed in farms and hamlets.

or

Bocage refers to a terrain of mixed woodland and pasture, with fields and winding country lanes sunken between narrow low ridges and banks surmounted by tall thick hedgerows that break the wind but also limit visibility, like parts of Surrey.
It is a word of Norman origin and is used in both the English and French language.

or

Bocage....go to Loire Valley Nature's full page description

Solstice slice up!

The White Wagtails [Motticilla alba alba] Bergeronnette grise are back...
they are not real migrants, but there is a movement south each year...
as with the Robins and Blackbirds...
if we see them over winter they won't be our local birds.

White Wagtail... watching something...

But it looks like we've got an ex-pat trying to muscle in....

In the UK the Pied Wagtail [Moticilla alba yarrellii] rules the roost...
However, I noticed a Pied Wagtail here two days ago, and he is still here...


Because of the terrible weather that is slowing the Cranes' migration northward...
and a colder than normal winter in the UK that caused Waxwings to be seen as far south as the Scillies...
this male Pied has travelled further south than normal...
and I think he likes it here...
probably for much the same reasons as we do!!

This morning I saw him again and went to photograph him....
only for him to fly off...
c'est la vie...
but the White Wagtails were there instead...
I decided to capture their portraits as well...


You will see that the one above is looking upward....
like Pauline and the owl yesterday, I couldn't see the whole picture through the lens...
suddenly all hell broke out...
he'd seen the male Pied coming down...
and the male pied attacked... they flew off towards the longére...
where I managed to catch the fight!

There are two birds here... the Pied Wagtail is the visible one!

And the fighters ascend

The Pied Wagtail is clearly the stronger... he's the one with his back to the camera!

The whirling dervishes... the Pied has his feet on the White's neck!

The Pied stayed dominant... and shortly after this, the White managed to break free.

In that last picture, the difference between the two sub-species is very clear...
the greater amount of black on the Pied [left in the picture] includes the underwing...
the White on the right is very clearly much greyer.

I managed a picture of the Pied Wagtail...

Terrible focus... but it shows the colours nicely.

And the White Wagtail for comparison.

Oooops! The White male has just been chased into the door by the Pied.... he's OK, I checked... standing close to his missus by the edge of the path...
I wonder if the Pied will stay, and try and see off the male of an established pair, or whether the pair bond will be the stronger?

And I've just seen the Black Redstart [Phoenicurus ochruros] Rougequeue noir....

The male in all his dinner jacket glory!

Spring is here...
despite the weather!!

Wol oi'm blowed!

He's back...
the Long-Eared Owl [Asio otus] Hiboux Moyen-duc was here again yesterday...
in fact it spent about four hours sitting on the ground in front of the Blackthorns.

We spotted him in the young shrubs at the edge of the clump...
I thought at first the overnight winds had blown a large ball of dead grass into the blackthorn...
I'd recently prepared areas for planting some willows.
But there he was, a wonderfully camouflaged lump of grass...
There is no way of telling the sexes apart...
but Pauline reckons that something that sits around for four hours at a time has got to be male!

Can you see it?

At one point, while he was sitting in the long grass, one of the female pheasants...
equally well camouflaged for long, dead grass... toddled over to "'ave a gander"...
Pauline, who was watching through the 'scope, could only see the owl...
but could work out the position of the pheasant by following the owl's eye-movements.

You should be able to see him now...
[The sticks are some recent plantings]

 The pheasant, I think, was of the opinion that it could have been one of her "sisters"...
Jeremy has a harem of around ten gals...
but once she had decided that it wasn't she beat a dignified, slow retreat...
until she saw two of the other gals and then she legged it over to them!!

Interestingly, the owl wasn't bothered by her presence...
nor did she try to mob it.
Neither, as far as we could see, did any of the other small passerines that spend time sitting in the blackthorn...
similar to their ignoring it when it was in the feeder tree the other day.

Long-eared Owls are recorded as breeding in the Grand Pressigny area...
they use the old nests of other large species...
or nest on the ground in clumps of fern... or under dense bramble or scrub.
So, as it nests from March onwards, I now need to be careful as to what I do by way of scrub bashing..

This picture was taken through my big 'scope.

We've seen it successfully hunting voles in the meadow...
but it is also reputed to be happy to take small birds from their roosts...
so why aren't they actively mobbing it?

If there is one breeding around here, we should see more activity in around a month or two's time...
when both parents will be feeding the young... we'll keep you informed!


On the subject of Owls:
This Saturday is the 10e Nuit de la Chouette....

but there are events on Friday and Sunday as well.

Locally there are events at Benais [nr. Bourgeil (37)] and at the Maison de la Nature in the Brenne [nr. St Michel en Brenne (36)]

Friday evening: 22/03/2013 - Soirée "Nuit de la Chouette" from 19h30-21h30 at the Maison de la Nature... with Tony Williams
Saturday afternoon and evening: 23/03/2013 - A la découverte des rapaces nocturnes from 15h30-22h00 at Benais
Saturday and Sunday at the Maison de la Nature - Week-end "Très chouette"
Saturday afternoon only: 23/03/2013 from 14h30-18h00
Sunday all day [except lunchtime!]: 24/03/2013 from 10h00-12h30 et 14h30-18h00

For more info visit the LPO's site .

Cranes fly backwards

On Tuesday 12th March a group of 23 cranes were seen over Luxembourg flying southwest in continuous snowfall... And 503 cranes were spottted similarly "retromigrating" over Marburg, Germany. Given recent TV weather pictures, I can't blame them!

Grues in the News

Out of the sun...

This weekend's influx of cranes moved La Nouvelle République to include an article in Thursday's Touraine Est edition with some interesting facts along with the usual purple prose. My attempt at a translation follows.

When the common cranes pass by ...
After a dreary winter, one looks out for all possible signs of the return of spring. And in that matter, nature has been particularly generous in the last few days. Numerous Tourangeaux have been able, notably on Monday afternoon, to observe impressive flights of cranes on spring migration.

"more than a metre long and with a wingspan up to 2.4 metres"

Several thousand of these big birds (more than a metre long and with a wingspan up to 2.4 metres), crossed the skies of Touraine on Monday afternoon, provoking marvelling comments from those who had the luck to see them. "Superb and extraordinary", "Grand spectacle", "It's magical, nature!", one could hear from witnesses, their eyes riveted towards the sky. Every year, it's the same ritual: the common cranes (Grus grus), which have wintered in southern Spain and Morocco, fly back to their nest sites (Denmark, Scandinavia, Poland, Russia) following a corridor about 200km wide which crosses our region via Indre, Cher, southern Loir-et-Cher and the Loiret, brushing Indre-et-Loire, where it is not rare to see flights. What is much more, by contrast, is the scale the phenomenon took this year.The atmospheric conditions of these last few days (strong east winds) have effectively shifted to the west the course of the birds.
The migration began in mid-February in Spain where it reached an end, according to observations, last Sunday. In Indre-et-Loire, the first flights were spotted on 18th and 20th February. After, nothing more, or almost, until Sunday, when about fifty cranes were seen near Villeperdue [not counting the ones we saw].
And it was Monday when the major part of the troupe passed by. The first sightings took place about 12:30 at Bossay-sur-Claise, the last at Neuillé-Pont-Pierre at 8pm. Between these times, several thousand birds flew over the Tours area, notably in the end of the afternoon. On Tuesday, a few latecomers (the gruppetto?) followed the peloton at a good distance.

God speed big birds!

At the same time, one could have seen several dozen white storks, notably over the Bretonnières lake at Joué-les-Tours, and some greylag geese.
Definitely, that has the whiff of spring! Except for the swallows: we must wait a little longer for them...

And not stopping for a weather check!!

The Daily Bugle... full story!

Posted just after midnight... so yesterday is Sunday and this report is for Monday 4th...
Blodger was playing up like crazy.

It's been a good couple of days for the sighting of Common Crane [Grus grus] Grue cendrée...

Four of the sunset flight today!

Yesterday at around 2:30pm a flight of 58 birds...

followed today by a flight at around the same time of 61 birds, well split up...

then... another flight at 3:28 of 70 individuals in two groups...

we then heard but didn't see birds at 4:30'ish and towards 5pm.

A tremendous noise at 6:10pm heralded a flight of 100 cranes, split into two groups flying almost together...

Wither goest thou?

and then to cap it all... at 6:25 a flight of 31 came flying out of the sunset... straight over us.

Out of the sunset they came!

Wing tips shining in the setting sun...

But it wasn't over... after dark I was busy building bee nestboxes for the solitary bees and heard three more groups before 8pm!


262 birds seen today...
plus who knows how many were in the groups we heard?
A major movement through our area...
never observed such a continuous succession of flights in one day before.

The wind was from almost due South all day and, in the constant sunshine, the temperature peaked at 18.5 °Centigrade at around 5pm.
They must have thought it was the perfect day to move on!

The big Carpenter bees were out... scouting for holes...
Pauline heard a Skylark practising...
I put up a pair of Sandpipers from the middle of the meadow...
not sure which of Green or Wood they were...
both have white rumps and both are here at this time of the year...
they jinked away too fast...

And we got some nestboxes up...

T'was a grand day, Grommit!!

The Daily Bugle

Twittering again...
we've had cranes over at intervals all afternoon...
heading straight down the Aigronne Valley.
Both sides of us and just five minutes ago....
straight overhead.
Full blog entry later...