Red-crested pochard's
Photo credit: Chris Farthing
Chris Farthing’s Woodberry bird highlights: May 2024
Little egret
Photo credit: Chris Farthing
May here is generally a month of two halves. The tail-end of the spring migration period dominates the first half of the month, with passage migrants likely and the last of our summer breeding birds arriving. From around mid-month birds start to become more settled, and from then on, breeding-related behaviour dominates.
One bird group which didn’t follow the rules here this month were the winter ducks. Several species of duck which are either winter residents or regular late winter visitors hung around a lot later than usual. Red-crested pochard (above) in the past have been most common in March and April, as males (which far outnumber females in the London area) wander in search of a mate. This year though, we had to wait until May 28th for a first visit, with two males spending the morning here. Both shoveler and shelduck were also seen on-and-off all month.
Common sandpiper
Photo credit: Chris Farthing
Common sandpiper (above) are a very regular passage migrant here and we had a handful of sightings around the middle of May including one of two birds together. Swallows were also seen passing over on migration a few times in the first half of the month.
Common tern
Photo credit: Chris Farthing
Common terns (above) are usually regular visitors from the nearby tern colony at Walthamstow Wetlands during the summer months, but this year a permanent presence on one of our tern rafts indicated that they were actually nesting here. Successful nesting would be a significant event because it would be the closest nesting site to central London for the species (Greenwich Ecology Park being the usual closest). Peregrines are another species that seems to be spending more time here than previous years.
Little egrets (below) enjoy low water levels here and were seen most days through May. These birds are probably from the Walthamstow nesting colony.
Little egret
Photo credit: Chris Farthing
Sand martins are one of the earlier migrant species and we sometimes have the first visit here in early March. This year we had to wait until May 16th for the first sighting. Two days later on the 18th, a rain shower brought down around eighty swifts in a feeding group, and a few each of both sand martin and house martin were amongst them. Five house martins also flew over on the 31st.
The total number of bird species seen here in May 2024 was 60, around ten lower that the totals from five to ten years ago, with the drop probably due to the increasing urbanization of the surrounding area.