The Lincolnshire Bird Club

Hi All,

I thouight it might be wise to put all the records of dead birds on the forum, to see how this Winter compares with other Winters. This is because, for the first time in my life, I saw a dead swan, species unknown, on the banks of the River Witham at Fosdyke. The increase in the numbers of dead birds this winter may go on to help us understand how susceptable birds are to the changes in winter temperature and more specifically, which species. For instance scavangers, such as Red Kite, will actually increase in numbers, next Spring.

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Alastair Carr

Where there is a will, there is a way....

Have already seen Two dead Mute swans on Nocton Fen but suspect these are casualties of the Wires. My wife brought home a half dead Black-headed Gull the other day "which was nice". It soon died.

Have they moved the Witham? or do you mean Welland?

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http://birdmanbirds.blogspot.com/

Went to Welney Sunday, didn't do a dead swan count but there were several dead out on the ice, a f kestrel was feeding off one.

1 dead 1st winter mute swan in drain alongside B1200 Saltfleetby st Clements 020111, 2 dead barn owls found by vol reserve manager under trees in Tetney Blow Wells reserve 261210, 2 dead song thrush under ivy/hawthorns Churchill Lane car park 281210. John.

This is a very good project if we can pull together a substantial amount of information;

In a distance of 6kms along the Humber foreshore Goxhill - East Halton Skitter I found 8 Curlew corpses, 2 Lapwing and 2 Woodcock this was without a dedicated search of the rough grass where many birds may well have died and of course many corpses will have been scavenged by foxes --before the freeze there were up to 300 Curlew on this section but as the freeze took hold numbers fell to about 120 so hopefully many birds did move before the severe freeze;
In areas where I do surveys there were regularly up to 8 Barn owls in November but I have seen just 2 since then and none at Alkborough where there are usually 5-6 birds;
I have not heard a single Cetti's Warbler at Barton since mid November and Bearded Tits also now seem to be wiped out;
As all our pits have been frozen for 5 weeks there have not been any Little or Great Crested Grebes for this period whereas usually there are 50+ Little Grebes and 20+ Great Crested in winter; these birds will presumably have moved to ice free waters but where did 500 Coots go?
Obviously large dead birds will feature heavily in any observations but it is just as informative to record just what you do not see that you would normally record at this time of year; eg 4 Reed Buntings at Alkborough where there were 200 last february

Adrian White reported;
9 redshank, 2 grey plover and a turnstone corpse along 300m of shoreline at Bennington on 24/12/10.

I've not seen any mortality events at Frampton/Freiston, but there haven't been many live ones either due to the frozen conditions. Birds have started returning in the past few days though....

John

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Contact: recorder_south@lincsbirdclub.co.uk

either side of the sea bank from top of hide track up to the sea hide, Freiston

5 redshank
1 turnstone
1 common gull

Paul

Please, please thoroughly check all the corpses for rings. This will give some vital information as to the birds' origin and lifespan.

somewhat oddly Stuart of the 9 Curlew I have found only one had its legs with the corpse -- I found that rather odd!

Coot numbers (all living!) at Thurlby Sand Pit recently, before and during the freeze.

15/10/10 370
28/11/10 377
30/12/10 320
03/01/11 324

Despite most of the pit being frozen, still good numbers present.

Dead heron and curlew on Far Ings at the end of dec.

Dead chicken in the South of France! (Dad ran it over!!!!!!!)

But also there was a dead Moorhean on the River Don, Sheffield. But that's fast flowing? It shouldn't have frozen, it certainly wasn't when I saw it today.

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Alastair Carr

Where there is a will, there is a way....