I was disheartened this evening to arrive at the pools and see that the little ringed plover that was on its second clutch was having the nest well and truly plundered by a carrion crow.
The parent plover was doing its bet to lure the crow away but the corvid was having none of it. Even a group of magpies were tormenting the LRP further by chasing it! The crow demolished the lot pretty quickly.
I've been keeping my eye on the nest for a bit and this clutch was over the halfway mark. My initial concerns were that the eggs weren't going to hatch before the schools broke up - a couple of kids who regularly play around the ponds had found the nest on Saturday, though after I'd talked to them they'd promised to keep away from it. Pity I couldn't have had the same conversation with the crow...
Otherwise, a common sandpiper was also present. The new little grebe nest has been repaired following a good submerging after the rain, and a bird was actually sat on top of it this evening. That should prove a bit more difficult for the crows to get at.
4 green sandpiper and 3 curlew were visible on the Wildfolwers' Pools, as viewed from the gate.
Welcome to Aldcliffe & Freeman's Wood, Lancaster - an area of the Lune Estuary in Morecambe Bay, North Lancs.
2 comments:
Sad tale Jon. If you can muster up any feelings at all about the birds we love to observe and study......a sad tale. I think the only good thing - if you can call it that - to come out of this is the fact that natural predation was slightly better than the 'kids' predation.
I agree Pete, I'd have been furious if the nest had been destroyed by vandalism or similar. As I stood watching the event I just resigned myself to the natural spectacle.
Unfortunate, but just part of the bigger picture we all love so much...
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