PHASE 1 COMPLETE.

The Coastal Conservation Group are delighted to say that Phase 1 of the Whitburn CP Project has been completed. The Large Pond/Wader Scrape is finished and has a brand new Timber Screen overlooking it. The Small Pond is finished and is just waiting for Mother Nature to fill it up as quickly as possible. The Bird Feeding Area has been prepared and a little pond has been constructed for birds to drink/bathe in just in front of where the Stone Viewing Screen will be erected. The concrete foundation is in ready for the Stone Screen, and a lovely new path leading up to it is also done. Its all been done in the two weeks we were told it would take and everything is bang on schedule. We are extremely happy with how this Project has gone so far and cant thank the contractors enough for the great job they have done. A site meeting was had on sunday morning with the next contractor and fingers crossed work on Phase 2 (the construction of the Stone Viewing Screen) should begin in the middle of February. Here's hoping it goes just as smoothly as the first part!

THE SMALL (NORTH) POND ALREADY STARTING TO FILL UP

TIMBER SCREEN OVERLOOKING THE BIG POND

THE BIG (SOUTH) POND/WADER SCRAPE

COMPLETED FOOTPATH TO STONE HIDE AREA

FOUNDATION FOR STONE HIDE

AREA FOR BIRD FEEDING STATION

LITTLE POND IN BIRD FEEDING STATION AREA

ONGOING WORK

The small pond is now fully lined and looking great, and yesterday the guys made a start on putting the drainage pipes in.





Today work began on the area where the stone viewing screen will be built. Hopefully the weather will remain kind to us!

With the liner down on the big pond, the next stage is to fill it with soil, which was being done when I visited this lunchtime!

COMING ON NICELY

The timber viewing screen is up and almost complete. It looks really good and the view over the big pond will be superb.




Both ponds have been fully scraped and levelled ready for the liners.






The big pond has the underlay and liner down. Its looking excellent!

AND SO IT BEGINS.............

I had a very brief visit to the Nature Reserve this lunchtime and was absolutely delighted to see that the work has started at last!

MOUND WORK

This morning we finished the site management of the Ringing Mound at the Coastal Park. We cut back and cleared the final section of greenery, which really does look excessive at the moment but when the spring arrives it'll look better than ever. When the cutting back was completed we then planted another batch of Willows in a few different areas of the Mound. These are one of the easiest plants to establish, so again it wont be long before these have filled the place out.





CUTTING BACK







PUTTING BACK

NOT LONG NOW

Well, the wait is pretty much almost over! On monday morning, work will finally begin on our longstanding project at Whitburn Coastal Park. Its certainly been a long time coming. In fact its been well over a year in coming!!! But when that first Digger rolls on site at 9.00am everything will have been worth it. These pictures show how the Nature Reserve looks today. As time goes by I will regularly post pictures on how the place is transformed.

2012 SOUTH TYNESIDE BIRD RACE

Yesterday was one of the most eagerly awaited days of the year for me, the annual South Tyneside Bird Race. A challenge to see (or hear!) as many different species of birds as possible in an 8 hour period. The beauty of this is you never really know what you are going to see or miss, no matter how much planning goes into it. This year my team was without one of our long term members, Dougie, due to family commitments so it was just the three of us (myself, Steve (Seggs), & Paul Dann) to carry on the challenge. The following are the sites we visited and the more notable birds we saw.........

TROW QUARRY
We started the day at Trow in the hope of an early sighting of one of the resident Little Owls, but unfortunately they didnt come out to say hello. We had to make do with a couple of the commoner species of Gull and a flock of Oystercatchers. A couple of Shags flew by out at sea and a single Red Throated Diver followed soon after. We had a walk up to the mound and flushed a pair of Reed Buntings but nothing else.

MARINE PARK
A nice walk round the park got us our first song birds including Greenfinch and Coal Tit, and also Great Spotted Woodpecker which was heard but not seen. On the pond we got our first ducks of the day including a few Pochards, but unfortunately no sign of the Mandarin today.

MARSDEN CAR PARK
Our first attempt failed to get us the resident Med Gull, but thankfully a nice old lady brought along some bread and in swooped the Med Gull on cue for us to be able to tick it.

MARSDEN QUARRY
Another attempt at a Little Owl, and unfortunately another dip!

WHITBURN CEMETERY
A long shot, we had a look to see if any Tawny Owls were out. They were'nt.

BOLDON FLATS
The feeders got us the expected Yellowhammers and Tree Sparrows. The pond had Wigeons and Teals but nothing else of note. Stock Doves were in the fields, but the highlight was a cracking Peregrine flying over that myself and Paul got a look at but Steve was in the wrong place and missed it!

NEWTON GARTH FARM
Rooks and Grey Partridge were the only new additions here.

COLLIERY WOODS
There's usually quite a big flock of Lesser Redpolls here, but amazingly we only seen one bird! Still, it was a tick. The other bird that everybody comes here for is the Willow Tit that comes to feeders in a garden that backs onto the woods. After an anxious few minutes we managed to see one. We also got a lovely male Bullfinch as a nice bonus.

RED BARNES POND
Apparently this place is literally only just in South Tyneside. In fact half of the pond is actually in the borough of Gateshead! But the three new birds we got here (Goosander, Jay & Siskin) all counted in the Race.

SAXON WAY - JARROW
A quick look here got us Mistle Thrush but no Waxwings.

RIVER DON/JARROW SLAKE
Our first Redshanks of the day and amazingly the first Cormorants were a good start, and after a little search the hoped for Little Grebe put in an appearance. The mouth of the Don got us Herons, Shelduck and an unexpected Eider flying past.

JARROW CEMETERY
The only new bird here was a big flock of Redwings, but we did get to see a GS Woodpecker this time.

WHITBURN STEEL
We got here just as the tide was in, and unfortunately the wader numbers werent that high. But we did manage to see 8 new species for our list.

SHIELDS PIER
Seeing as we missed out on the Ringed Plovers at the Steel we had to pop over here to see them. Thankfully there were a handful on the beach.

WHITBURN LODGE CARPARK
We had pretty much finished for the day so headed off to the pub to meet up with the other teams, but as we were waiting in the car park a flock of over 100 Pink Footed Geese flew high overhead. One more species for our list!


At the end of the day, we were actually disappointed with our total, which was 72 species. This was quite low compared to recent years but it was actually enough to get us joint second with Keith, Ian & Greames team. The winning team of John Brown, Andy, Hoggy and Walter had a total of 79 species which was quite comfortable in the end. But as I keep saying, it really doesnt matter in the slightest who wins, its just an extremely pleasurable day out with your mates. What more could you ask for!!!

REPAIRS & PLANTING

Myself, John B, John S, Dougie & Keith got together this morning to do some repairs to a section of wooden fencing that had been damaged on the edge of Whitburn Coastal Park. Thanks to my brilliantly effective supervising the job was finished in less than an hour. And what a mighty fine job it was, too. Its amazing what a bit of hard work and enthusiasm can get you! That little job out the way, we then met up with Adrian on the Ringing mound to do a bit more thinning of the foliage up there. At the minute it looks pretty drastic but come the spring it will soon fill out again. We also planted a load more Willows in another section of the mound, and these take no time at all to establish. All in all, it was a very productive couple of hours!

Tomorrow is one of the most eagerly awaited days of the year - the 2012 South Tyneside Bird Race. Although the number of participants have been disappointing the last couple of years its still a hugely enjoyable day for those taking part. Last year my team finished 3rd, so I'm hoping to improve this time round. Although in all honesty it really doesnt matter where we come, its all about enjoying the day.

2011 IN PICTURES #3 (BIRD RINGING)