Out of Lockdown with a Rose-coloured Starling
The past four months have been an utterly bizarre period in which everything
has changed yet also stayed strangely familiar. For instance I’ve been
fortunate in that my job has allowed me to continue working full time, albeit
from home, yet any preconceptions I had about getting things done
around the house and catching up on my TV viewing have proved massively wide of
the mark. Instead overtime and huge pressure have been the name of the game as
I and the rest of my team have worked our socks off to help our employer
through these unprecedented circumstances. A side effect of this has been that
my once carefully cultivated separation between work and home life has broken
down almost completely, particularly when lockdown was at its height. For
weeks on end my daily highlight was sitting in a different room and any
impetus to switch from one laptop to another for blogging purposes was sorely
lacking.
The only thing that really kept me going were our once a day permitted outings
which felt at times more like mandatory exercise sessions during a prison
sentence than something to be relished. Nevertheless we made the most of them
and took on the challenge of seeing as many of our normal seasonal species as
possible. Clearly some such as Puffins were going to be extremely unlikely but
we had remarkable success elsewhere. Particular highlights included a flock of
Golden Plover on the hills behind our house as well as the discovery
that we can view a Little Egret roost from the bedroom window. Then
there was the family of Spotted Flycatchers and at least two reeling
Grasshopper Warblers back on their traditional territories for another
year. Best of all though were the number of Swifts which arrived this
summer, far in excess of the solitary individuals recorded last year. Sitting
in the garden we were regularly treated to small groups screaming their way
overhead and strongly suspect that a house down the road from us had at least
a couple of active nests. Do I detect a spot of Swift next box building in my
near future?
I still couldn’t help myself feeling jealous however as I followed those on
Twitter fortunate enough to enjoy coastal patches. Having lived near or next
to the sea for the last twenty years not having ready access proved a real
struggle despite being able to see the distant Gower coastline from home.
Those views were no substitute for walking its beaches in person.
Was it really any surprise therefore that as soon as lockdown restrictions
began to ease here in Wales, the first destination I had in mind was the
coast. But suddenly I found myself hesitating. Month after month of soaring
death tolls (including someone I knew personally) had left me in a state of
anxiety helped not inconsiderably by the apparent perception in the general
populace that the danger had passed. Even walking locally what attempt at
social distancing had existed when passing on paths had already largely
disappeared. I needed a push to get me back out there and to regain
confidence.
Step forward a Rose-coloured Starling.
It’s been an excellent year for the species with individuals popping up across
much of the country and finally, on the 15th July, it was our turn. The
initial discovery was made earlier that morning but with a day of online
meetings stretching out before me I was housebound until gone five. A quick
dash down to Burry Port followed and after a thorough search of the area
things were not looking good. Memories of my last abortive attempt at seeing
one along Aberavon seafront began to resurface, that dip coming courtesy of
gale force winds and a Starling cast numbering in the thousands. With by now a decent crowd of observers assembled we continued
the hunt, everyone pleasingly observing the social distancing protocols.
Before heading home we did a quick circuit of the harbour area where the usual
Redshanks had been joined by a lone Greenshank whilst out on the
exposed sandbanks we got to see our first Oystercatchers since March.
One last sweep of the Starling flocks showed plenty of juveniles but
the Rose-coloured Starling remained elusive and as far as I know was
not seen again.
A week or so later we were back, albeit a couple of miles along the coast at
Pwll. Another post work jaunt for fresh air coincided perfectly with some
glorious sunshine and at long last we were able to catch up with the
Sand Martin colony. There were still a couple of active nest holes but
what struck me most was the significant erosion that has taken place since
last year. Having not been able to visit earlier in the spring I can’t be sure
if this has happened more recently and if so what the impact may have been to
the colony. However to my eyes there looked to be far less burrows visible than I
remember.
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