Linacre WeBS - August 2015

I wasn't able to do this month's WeBS walk at Linacre last week, so I popped down today. It was quite quiet, as is normal at this time of year, but I was very pleased to see a female Tufted Duck with 5 small ducklings! This is the 3 brood that have been reported this year. Here are a few photos.

Female and 5 ducklings

1 of the 5 ducklings

Proud mum!

The female bird was very protective of the 5 ducklings (which you'd expect), and it was amazing to watch the young birds as they dived constantly for food. It's also very interesting to see the stiff tail feathers on the ducklings, which they use to help when diving, and the bills, which look a bit too big for the youngsters!

There were 3 young Mandarin Ducks around today, including 2 that sat up on the wall of the top reservoir.

Mandarin Duck

Totals for this month were: Mallard (37), Tufted Duck (21; 16 adults and 5 ducklings), Mandarin Duck (3 juveniles), Grey Wagtail (3), Kingfisher (1), Coot (5 adults), Moorhen (4; 2 adults and 2 juveniles), Grey Heron (1). Other birds seen today included Robin (1 juvenile), Swallow (6) and House Martin (5).