Summer Behaviour at the Lake.

This picture taken in early June shows the family of four signets becoming instant attractions to the boating public in their first week on the lake after hatching.


This is the only family to successfully hatch and have signets on the lake. I think it is the only time in the time i have been following the swans at Roath that there has only been one family group.


Does anyone know has it been a poor year for swans in other places too?


I and some friends went out in a rowing boat earlier this month to view activities on the lake ... we discovered several grebes nests as the slide show on the right shows.





...... lets now look and see how life has progressed on the lake since as the summer quickly passes!










In foreground of the above picture can be seen a late coots nest built out into the water, with the coot sitting on the eggs.


This picture shows the same nest this week with one of the young coots on the nest. Young coots seem to keep a link with the family nest for quite sometime. This is the case until the adult coots take over the nest to incubate another clutch of eggs.


It will be interesting to see if this nest in fact has a second clutch of eggs.














Life round the Islands:

I painted this portrayal of the waters round the islands early this morning before the park became busy with the Sunday crowds. It is very clear that their is a fine balance in the park as i the summer months the park sees much activity with people and wildlife must take to the foliage of the islands and the protection of the above tree canopy .... but there is much activity of many kinds while the park is relatively quiet in the early morning.

In the background of the painting can be seen a family of grebes, the second to hatch here in the park. They nested under the protection of the foliage of the islands and four chicks were hatched nearly a fortnight ago. In the picture (left) the four chicks can be seen quite clearly with one of the grebes. The other will be away getting food and comes to the family underwater to hide their location, Four is a large number for grebes and will require much hunting by the adult grebes, Periodically gulls swooped above a reminder of the vulnerability of these chicks at this stage.

In the foreground of the painting can be seen the fast growing signets who seem to get escorted with one parent ahead and the other bringing up the rear in a convoy as they come up from their roosting area to dabble on the young fresh reed to be found up here.

Here too coots dive and there is the odd stand off over territory as coots ruffle up their plumage to defend their Territory's as the coot is depicted doing in the centre of the painting. On occasion they will fight. Alsol note the fast changing flora as summer progresses.

Geese behaviour

It seems when there has been fresh rain, the fresh rain water seems a better option for the geese than the water to be found in the lake!

This week the weather brought regular down pours and this week I saw the young gosling leading the way to the road side to drink from the water laying along the road sides.

It can be seen how dangerous it is for passing motorists!!

Has anyone seen this behaviour in other places?

A Coot Encounter with a grebe on the nest under the willow!

This young Coot who was from the first clutch to be incubated and is about seven weeks old does not have the same sort of problems as the gosling ... he has own bottle (is it Brains SA maybe) at his ready disposal!!

At the beginning of this week the parents hatched out their second brood of young!!

The only problem was under that particular willow there were two nests one belonging to the coots and in close proximity was a grebes nest ...... and unfortunately the young coot did not yet recognise its parents plumage!!

the coot chick edged its way up to the grebes nest. The Grebe initially was quite tolerant but as the the little un continued to seek attention the grebe became agitated and rose from the eggs and commenced pecking at the little innocent coot!!

..... within seconds the parent coots came racing across the water like athletes and it was quite difficult to see who ended up under the water as the water splashed up reflecting the ferocity of the battle

..... the Grebe came out of it with its feathers fluffed out round its head and the tiny coot made its escape!!

In the painting below I have created a composite illustration of the stages of the action, it may seem all a little confusing but that reflects the action itself ... ferocious but over in an instant as the grebe returned to the job in hand incubating those eggs!!

An unusual Encounter

I had spent most of the week at Rowen and on the Friday the cloud was blowing in off of the coast and the mountain tops were covered by wisps of cloud blowing across.

Throughout the week I had seen many Buzzards gliding on the rising warm air, often in pairs. On my previous walk up this way earlier in the week I had seen a pair of Buzzards being mobbed by a pair of crows. In the rocks there were many crows.

I had stopped and made a sketch of a stone chat as it flew between branch and rock chanting its chat chat continually making me wonder if it was guarding a nest.

I followed paths often mistaking sheep tracks to St Celynin Church, a small 12 century chapel which I remembered often visiting on walks from Penmaenmawr. Today I was following a route from the youth hostel and was planning to head towards Conwy. This route followed a lane which wound its way down between stone boundary walls and thick woodland. I was making good progress and was some what mesmerised by the heat, the setting and was only quite distantly aware of the sound of bird making quite a commotion in the trees above me.

I thought nothing more of it!

I was planning to walk around the far side of the river Conwy and back to Rowen. It was to be long walk!

I was totally unaware that the screeching bird(s) above were showing concern at my presence .... until quite suddenly as I was walking through quite an enclosed area of woodland I had a thump on the back of my head, which thankfully was protected by my leather hat! Momentarily I was stunned ... what ever was it .... then I saw a bird a little ahead of me flying at my height as it flew up onto a branch above. At first glance it looked like an owl.

as I investigated and taking photos with my camera, I became aware of the birds quite massive talons.

...... it was quite obvious the bird had not got the result it had hoped for and it circled in round quite close again .... I believe my saving grace was the fact that the lane was so enclosed by trees that instead of swiping me for a second time the bird perched again on another branch.

I quickly got another couple of shots but realised this bird was really not happy at my presence and quickly descended down the lane warily looking out for anymore low flying birds!

Once at a safe distance I made a quick sketch of my close encounter!

This is a view looking back up the lane and to the upland location of the old church. In those trees I had an encountered quite an unusual with a bird of prey, quite poignant when one has regularly demonstrated the stoop of the peregrine to visitors to the RSPB project in Cardiff.

The following day I returned to the location with my friend Rob and there was little sign of the birds initially, however after a short time the two birds were circling above the trees. Even with the birds just circling i was keen to make an exit, which Rob noted with some surprise!! There was no commotion as the day before. I can only assume the previous day, the bird had seen me descending from way back at the old church and by the time I reached the area of the trees where the buzzard probably had its nest or where a chick was fledging. Therefore, it was threatened and defending its young went into action, catching me totally unaware!

The high trees .... probably the site of the Buzzards nest, which accounts for the aggressive nature of the bird.

Since returning home I have researched similar incidents on the Internet to find there were several reported incidents in 2009 where the Buzzard had actually caused loss of blood and in several occasions made more than one attack on the Innocent passerby. Newspaper reports also suggest that Buzzards have been known to attack cyclists, wearing helmets in a similar way, and will even do damage to car aerials as they pass!

I sensed I had been fortunate to have been able to see the funny side of the encounter with the bird and have made painted a self portrait to record the event!

Self Portrait: Clive quite unaware of approaching Buzzard.