April 24th – A short exercise ride, still working from home, mostly. Despite the strangeness in everyday human society, the natural world continues as normal.
Nice to see the moorhens pairing off to mate. Such humble, unassuming little birds.
I keep saying it, but it’s the normal, beautiful events of spring that are keeping me going day to day at the moment.
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July 22nd – In the middle of the canal at Catshill Junction, in the midst of the algae mat, a mother proudly sits on a nest. A nest built upon driftwood flotsam trapped in the algae.
I’ve been watching her a few days. You can see trails in the surface from her partner coming to feed her, or take his shift sitting.
Safe from foxes and other land predators, this moorhen mum’s got a relatively secure nest.
It’ll be interesting to see how this develops!
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December 2nd – Again passing through the Wood, this time to Screwfix, it was a grim, miserable, drizzly dank day – but at least it was much, much warmer than in previous days.
The ice was melting, and some of the less religiously inclined types were relishing their fast diminishing ability to walk on water…
May 12th – Slowly recovering from my tribulations, I headed off to Birmingham along the canals and through Sandwell Valley Park for some light relief. It was a dreadfully dark, rain-spattered day but the birdlife I saw was incredible. From the bluetits near Park Hall to the young waterfowl all along the canals of the area, multiplication really is the name of the game.
Glad to see the six cygnets all present and correct at Catshill Junction, and who knew gulls could yawn?
May 2nd – The canals locally are a joy at the moment. Spring is in full effect and in one short journey between Walsall and Darlaston I saw new goslings, moorhen and coot chicks and an older family of ducklings.
When your ride to work contains such wonderful things, it’s hard not to have a great day.
June 21st – It may be the solstice, but the mating behaviour continues on the canal. With many mallards now on second broods, I noticed this industrious moorhen building a huge nest on the canal at Pleck.
She was very busy and the structure contains some interesting items. I’ll be intrigued to see if she uses it.
May 24 – I ‘m convinced that whatever gave rise to moorhens and coots existing had the plans backwards. Baby coots – featured here last week – look, as Phil Griffin put it ‘Like badly knitted moorhens’ – and he’s right. On the other hand, apart from the remarkable feet, these moorhen chicks could easily thought to be coots.
The antics of both are hugely comical, however. So nice to see.
August 13th – It may be late summer, but there’s still young ones about on the new pool at Clayhanger – fine, healthy mallard ducklings pottered about, as did a couple of moorhen chicks out with mum.
Ducklings have all the cute – but young moorhens seem to have the same dishevelled, grumpy appearance as young owls. They look like befuddled old men.
They are very endearing though.
February 5th – I feel sorry for the waterfowl during this cold snap, really, which is probably a bit daft. As I took a gentle spin down the canal today, I noticed lots of forlorn looking ducks, canada geese, coots and moorhens loafing around disconsolately on the frozen canal, which itself was covered in a messy layer of slush. I watched as birds struggled to land, skidding frantically along the ice. They are, to coin a phrase, like ducks out of water. I did notice something though, today. Moorhens don’t have webbed feet. I find that a bit surprising, but as these footprints show, they haven’t got the best feet for swimming. There must be an evolutionary reason for this. Wonder what it is?
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