Blog Content — Gavin Vella

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Cwmbran

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Boating Lake Diversity

Short trip around the Boating Lake today, was nice to bump into Steve Williams (our head ecologist) doing his regular Gull checks for rings. Steve has had some fantastic results photographing ringed birds with his camera, something that is far from easy considering you have to photograph the ring from many different angles in order to read the whole number. As valuable as these rings are for conservation, they don't half make it hard sometimes to read. 

I was hoping to get some Goosander photographs, and was lucky to get what looked like an entire family or two with two adult males, one juvi male and 5 female type. Light wasn't great today though so didn't process any of those images. Upon talking with Steve we spotted a Water Rail in the middle on the island. A regular winter visitor here but while speaking about the Water Rail, we heard another to our left, and then another to our right! Turns out there are at-least 4 individuals onsite with another calling from the opposite side. This is a particularly large number for such a small pond and it goes to show that with the right management, you build the habitat and they will come. 

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Autumn Gone?

What is your favourite part of Autumn? For most people, it's the change of colours in the leaves before they fall. Red being the most popular and vibrant.. It's a shame I can't see it though uh? lol Red is one of those colours I know is there, so long as it isn't amongst other colours and isn't too dark (Needs to have light shining on it or emitting its own light). So how did I know which of my photos had red in it? Two reasons, 1. While looking at the photographs digitally, I can tweak the colours individually and physically see the changes. Usually I need to boost the reds up to extreme levels for me to see them, and then I can dial them back to a level that is acceptable to everyone else. I probably still get it wrong but nobody has complained so far lol.. would you tell me if I did? Probably not lol. 

For me, Autumn is more about the winter visitors and the summer departing birds. Much like the Brambling that seemed to have come back this year in decent numbers, unlike last year where we got very few reports in Gwent. Every year is different, dependant on weather conditions and available food. This is what makes autumn / winter special in my eyes, as you really have no idea what may turn up in what has to be the most energetic season of all. Everything is on the move, even your Garden birds tend to move down to warmer climates. I hate to burst any bubbles, but your resident Robin probably isn't the same Robin you've been seeing all summer. We get thousands of Blackbirds, Song Thrushes and Robins moving down from Scandinavia in the winter time and most never truly settle till they've found a stable food source in manageable temperatures. If it's too cold here, they'll even skip the Uk into France.. Joys of being a bird! I can't even begin to imagine the things they must encounter on their travels..

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Torfaen Biodiversity Partnership

Today I was very fortunate to be invited along to a meeting based around Biodiversity in Torfaen. Firstly, big thanks to Steve Williams (Torfaen's head ecologist) for inviting me and secondly, I'd just like to point out how lucky we are to have such great people and great minds sticking up for nature in our county. Without organisations like Gwent Wildlife Trust, Friends of the Earth, County Ecologists and self employed naturalists, our county and others surrounding it will be much worse off. Despite feeling quite 'safe' in their hands, they still need all the help they can get so if there is anything you yourself can do to support your local conservation groups, please help out. 

1 of the sites we visited today was, believe it or not... was Pets at Home in cwmbran.. Why on earth uh? Well, I heard about this before but thanks to some of the grassland being left to grow, we actually had wild Bee Orchids growing on the banks of the road side. This is a perfect example of how our ecology can re-establish itself sometimes if, just left alone. I learned a lot about grassland and meadows today which has made me appreciate my favourite meadows at Llandegfedd even more. 

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Below I've included some photographs from yesterdays short morning trip around Pontypool. Happy to see another Redkite and also find quite good numbers of Redstarts. 

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