July 26th
There is a belated report of a Redshank near Mannez lighthouse from yesterday. Today 4 Little Egrets were in Longis Bay this evening and a second pair of Swallows nesting in the German bunker opposite the Obs gates successfully fledged 4 young.
There are many and various programs set for the future – a new ringing hut, Helgoland traps, screening on the reserve and so on. Other projects taking shape are the Willow whips planted 6 weeks ago intended to offer cover from the public car park for the birds visiting the sewage works and these have all taken surprisingly well. The public works department have delivered a dozen (previously condemned) telegraph poles to us so that that we can set them up at a location where we can offer migrating birds a resting/roosting site on telegraph-type wires.
Great excitement from our Moth expert David Wedd who has recorded Shore Wainscott, a new species for Alderney, in fact 5 of them all at once on Longis Nature Reserve. The Alderney moth list is somewhere around 900 species; this blog entry reminds me I must ask him the exact species total !
Garden Tiger Moth – Obs Garden