Walks into the Welsh mountains and a new writer on my blog

With the last of my holidays I decided to split them up into long weekends and I have given myself a long weekend every month to get on the Welsh coast and go up into the mountains to retune to nature and forget about the boredom of working in a retail environment surrounded by people stuck in there ruts. Sometimes the groundhog day feeling needs to be broken either in the mountains or by the sea.

 

The air was warm the sun was shining to explore the mountain was my goal and I found a lovely few wild swimming/camping spots with views, peace and waterfall pools and I think I did just that and seeing Buzzards and choughs on the wing made the short trip worthwhile. 

As I headed into the mountains my younger brother Ryan went by the sea with his camera in hand to see what he could encounter while enjoying the nature of the coastal wild spots. 

 

Below is a post written by him and his adventures of the day.

SATURDAY 9TH OCTOBER 2022 

UNEXPECTED WILDLIFE ENCOUNTERS

On Saturday 9th Sept 2022 I was in North wales for a few days on the coast, I had planned to go to aber ogwen spinnies nature area to see if the Mute swans were still gathering. On my arrival there I was unable to access the beach and was advised by Bird ringers Kate and Joel not to go on the beach as they were doing a catch of redshank for annual ringing on the Menai Straits as part of SCAN’s monitoring project they also said on the radio let the swan guy know there are 4 Whooper swans in the flock. I managed to count 99 Mute swans = (104 swans) I Was like wow ran to the hide and got some pics of them they then left the flock and flew off towards the great orme. 

They said the cannon net will be going off and banging in around 40 mins they said you were more than welcome to come over once they are in the boxes. I decided to wait in anticipation to see what surprises the wooden boxes on the shore held.

 

They found something unexpected and very shocked to come across a LONG-BILLED DOWITCHER are rare Wader which you don't tend to see. They also had over 150+ redshank 1 of which was an Icelandic redshank) and 5 Curlew sandpipers. It was a fantastic experience to watch. I learnt so much about SCAN and BTO wader ringing. They put silver rings on all the birds before weighing and taking wing and beak length. It was a Wicked day and one that I will remember for a long time.

 Thank you for reading

Diaries of Cheshire wildlife watcher brothers

A month well 2 weeks of Summer nature 1 of 2

With a busy month gone by and Summer in full flow albeit a bit wet but that does not put a dampener on things as Ive been out and about enjoying Nature as usual. I spent one week wild camping and week in a cottage on the coast of North Wales and on the island of Anglesey. I discovered a few new places a visited a few that I visted of the winter as the greenery really looked stunning with all the beautiful wild flowers in colours of the rainbow. I will post of few that stood out to me as I will use this blog post next year when planning my summer trip. We found a lovely new Fulmer nesting cliff where you can get quite close without disturbing and away from the crowds.

Along the coastal cliffs we ran into a Raven family with a brood of five fledgeling young learning navigate the winds and cliff edges. As well as the Ravens a family of Peregrines were hid in a rocky outcrop as you could hear the young getting excited when the parents brought in pray.

I was hoping to revisit South stack but decided to visit a Nature reserve on Holyhead that has a secret beach and we also found Red Squirrels nearby at 2 feeding stations. I love watching them stick there heads out from the feeders checking if we had come any closer.

These Gulls had made use of the cliffs where the fulmars nested and the 2 babies looked very safe.

Porth wen was a place to revisit as the difficulty getting to it and open sea below with access to a secludded bay make this a real gem on the coast of Anglesey. The old brick works looks like a set piece from Harry Potter. A pair of Robins must have nested there as there were young on the beach and the parents kept coming to us and collecting any crumbs we dropped on the floor.

Perched on some of the old metal work it waited for a crumb

Before the tide came in I wanted to see what was in the rock pools from the last tide and what was coming into the pools with the rising tides. I took my snorkeling mask in my already overloaded bag but was worth it as I ended up swimming through a shoal of Sand eels and these small fish make this area so poplar with the Terns in the area. I'll visit these colonies when I am on holiday in July. There was also some stripey fish that came in with the tide as well as a few other creatures like crabs and shrimp.

Inbetween our two sepertae breaks we visted Burton mere RSPB reserve which costs £5 to visit if your not a member as there are some wonderful birds making themselves a home there including Bearded Tits which we did not see but our main bird was the spoonbill and as we arrived walking a cycle route from Chester in heavy rainfall abd high tempreturs it was nice to arrive and get comfy and as we arrived at the hide a Spoon bill landed rested, preened then got a moody with the local birds. After an hour on the lake the bird took off with a stick/reed for one of the nests that they have begun to build in nearby trees where Egrets have a colonie.

I also saw Bar tailed Gotwits and Avocets which I have only seen passing views of in the past

 I'll post more of the last 2 weeks in my next blog as I have run out of time plus I have just heard a cuckoo in some nearby trees as I write this on my Ipad.

Stay wild

Mike

Vote for the Britain's first Official National bird #VOTEHENHARRIER

 If you haven't heard then you can now vote for the Britain's first Official National bird. You can findout more information on how to vote on the Link below:

http://www.votenationalbird.com/

I have Voted for the Henharrier as out of all the final 10 birds it's one of the only birds in the list being persecuted to a level of extinction. To find out why it's so important we all vote for this stunning and often unseen bird. I recently read a great blog post which sums it up perfectly The post was written by Findlay Wilde who's a very intelligent and inspiring young man, I have placed a Link to his blog post below.

http://wildeaboutbirds.blogspot.co.uk/2015/03/why-vote-hen-harrier.html

USE YOUR HEART AND YOU HEAD AND YOU WILL COME TO THE SAME CONCLUSION I DID

VOTE FOR CONSERVATION - VOTE FOR HENHARRIER!!!!!

Thanks for reading my blog

Stay wild, be happy and be safe

Mike