Beached Bird Survey 2014

If anyone is planning to go birding/walking along Rhossili Beach between now and 2nd March, and would be willing to help with the Beached Bird Survey along this stretch, would you please let me know.
It involves looking for signs of dead seabirds (full corpses or parts e.g. wings), noting the numbers and identity of the bird(s) and whether there are signs of oiling on the birds and/or the beach.


We are clearly looking at a record year this year (in the wrong sense unfortunately), certainly since I took on the role of coordinating this survey in our area.  16 birds were found in Broughton Bay and 4 between Oxwich and Great Tor.  In addition I have received an independent report of 11 birds from part of Swansea Bay.  With no oiling reported so far is this an aftermath of the recent severe weather?


Thanks
Alastair Flannagan
alastair.flannagan@ntlworld.com

Port Eynon Bryophytes

A few of the species seen in the quarries on the point yesterday:

Encalypta vulgaris (Common Extinguisher-moss)

Fissidens dubius (Rock Pocket-moss)

Lejeunea cavifolia (Micheli's Least Pouncewort)

Scapania aspera (Rough Earwort)

Froggy business

It's that time of year again - just looked and there are five clumps of spawn in the garden pond following a lot of activity last night. We did actually see three clumps yesterday that looked a day or two old, so first spawn here was sometime over the weekend. With more wild-but-mild weather to come, I suspect there will be plenty activity locally...