11th February 2010
The Tide is High Blondie
I had been contacted by Chris Cockburn and he had offered to show me around the two RSPB reserves, Langstone Harbour and Pilsey Island RSPB Reserves, reserves where he was warden.
The latter one involved taking carbon transport as access was only
possible by crossing Ministry of Defence land, something I was not allowed to
do on my bike. Into a Land Rover we went and luckily for me no new birds for
the year were seen. There were however masses of waders as the tide was high
and the birds were having their twice daily rest. There were Bar-tailed
Godwits, Knot, Dunlin, Grey Plover and Redshanks by the thousand.
To Langstone Harbour RSPB Reserve next and a good rarity that had been recently promoted into a full species, Green-winged Teal [131].
This bird has recently been demoted to just a teal. Lumped through using DNA evidence; Green-winged and Eurasian Teal are now one species!
Then I took a long walk around the sea defence wall, pushing
the bike and chatting constantly with this wonderful man. Chris was one of the
'old guard' RSPB wardens, a rarity in himself, being an expert on birds unlike
the some of the new breed of conservation degree holding youngsters. I have
nothing against the new generation, the RSPB needs to become more inclusive and
its Nature's Home direction is understandable. This is the shape of the
organisation to come as they move away from their birds’ image to one of more
diverse wildlife approach. The RSPB has always cared for all of Britain's
wildlife forms yet due to name, people associate them with just birds. To me
the change is overdue for the World's biggest conservation group.
Back to talking about Chris though. He reminded me of my very dear late friend, Gordon Barnes, being fabulously knowledgeable and great fun to be with. A BBC Radio Solent interview of me during the day was difficult as Chris kept pointing to imaginary birds to distract me!
The reserve itself had exceptionally large numbers of Brent Geese and waders, with distant grebes on the water. The geese were in large flocks on the grassy meadows inland of the sea wall. In summer, Chris said, the reserve had large colonies of terns and I was to be invited to return and take a boat out with other RSPB volunteers to survey them. I have still to take up the offer. I must contact him.
21.35 miles
142 elevation up 185 feet down
Day ending with me reaching Portsmouth after stopping to take a photo of the fully laden bike outside Portsmouth Football Club's stadium. Up Pompey!
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