We had a great meeting on 22 March. Parents and young people came together for a briefing on how to do the nest box checks and we did a full check of the nest boxes. Out of 25 boxes 6 already had moss in significant volume so that is good news for early in the season.
We expect the first eggs around the second week of April.
We discussed the legalities of the Wildlife and Countryside Act. The wildlife and countryside act says it is illegal to destroy or harm a nest or eggs or to take the nest or eggs. We are checking the nest boxes and so we are not harming the eggs or chicks. When it comes to handling the chicks and ringing them this needs to be done by a licensed person. Ruedi has a license to handle and ring blue and great tits at the nest and so he will be doing this but we can arrange a meeting so that we can all accompany him!
We also went through various safety things and agreed on a rota for the checks which will run from the start of April to the end of May. Once the birds are incubating, nest checks will stop until we expect hatching to occur.
Aimee Moretti of The Conservation Volunteers joined us to help us with our knowledge of iNaturalist and the young people went off to record Moss – using the moss worksheets produced for the last meeting.
They also found twenty or thirty frogs spawning in the pond which was really exciting….It is DEFINITELY Spring!
Upper Woodburn 