Its worth a visit


Cuckoo arrives in local village

11/05/2016 13:22

A Cuckoo has spent most of this morning calling from bushes overlooking Hotworks Mill in Earlsheaton.The bird flew a short distance to change vantage points before flying off towards Thornhill at around 09:45.

The prescence of breeding Reed Warblers on the nearby sewage works is a key factor in the regularity with which cuckoos occur in this part of the Calder Valley and there are now 10 singing males on The sewage works at Dewsbury and just a single singing male on Kerries foods plantation just a hundred yards or so down river.

Whitethroats seem to have returned to their breeding sites in good numbers with 4 pairs on Kerries copse and 5 pairs on the sewage works at Dewsbury.

2 singing male Sedge Warblers are also in the same patch though the 3 Lesser Whitethroats which occured at the begining of the month appeared to have moved on.

A Common Sandpiper is on the river Calder near the metal footbridge at the bottom of Healy Road Ossett this morning.

2 Common Buzzards flew Westerly at 07:15 this morning over the willow plantations below Mill Bank Thornhill.

With the showery conditions early on Swifts and Hirrundines where in reasonable numbers over the filter beds of Dewsbury Sewage Works with some 200 Swifts,120 Swallows and around 60 House Martins.

The new Sand Martin colony below Mill Bank Thornhill has now some 24 pairs of Sand Martins entering their burrows with nesting material with the older colony at the moment holding some 40+ pairs.It would appear much of the old colony has been washed away in the early months of this year and the birds are having to excevate new burrows.

2 Oyster Catchers are still on the sewage works at Dewsbury with the 3rd bird present last week having chosen to move away from the site.

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