Sunday, May 31, 2009

Knockentiber to Springside disused railway line

I cycled along the disused railway line between Kilmarnock, Knockentiber and Springside at 0540h this morning to survey some farmland birds, finding: Yellowhammer (19 singing mm), Reed Bunting (3 mm), Whitethroat (9 mm), Sedge Warbler (7 mm), Blackcap (1 m), Willow Warbler (34 mm), Skylark (8 mm), Song Thrush (8 mm), Goldfinch (7 mm), Linnet (2 prs), Chaffinch (10 mm), Blackbird (10 mm), Wren (24 mm), Robin (7 mm), Dunnock (7 mm), Lapwing (2 territorial prs), Curlew (territorial bird), Grey Partridge (heard only). Plenty of hole nesting species in the beeches including 3 pairs of Tree Sparrow (minimum count from path only), Stock Dove, Jackdaw, Kestrel, Great Tit and Starling. Nesting Sand Martins also zipping along Garrier Burn

Painted Ladies were active from 0704h at least and before it was time for heading back for breakfast, 32 had been counted along with 12 Orange-tips plus the other three pierids. In Kilmarnock, Painted Ladies were heading NW at a rate of 2/min around midday but on the coast between Troon and Irvine, no obvious movement was detected. Gailes Marsh had 7 and a 1.5 km stretch south from Irvine harbour mouth produced just 15.


In the sonograms above: (1) Willow Warbler - territorial song verse (it makes a a nice looking spectrograph pattern, eh?); (2) Tree Sparrow - vocalisations uttered while perched close to the nest hole; (3) Yellowhammer - territorial song verse. A neighbouring bird consistently sang without the terminal 'cheese' phrase. Another neighbour switched between a high-pitched 'cheese' ending and a low-pitched ending, one after the other at almost a 50:50 ratio; (4) Sedge Warbler - section of a much longer delivery of territorial song from a bird low in hawthorn scrub.

1 comment:

Warren Baker said...

some great birds on your list Fraser. Dis used raiway lines always make for good habitat