February 2017: Rye Harbour Nature Reserve Sightings

Chris Bentley
, 28 February 2017
February 2017: Rye Harbour Nature Reserve Sightings
Rob Zveers

One of the bird highlights during February was a hen harrier which was seen at Castle Water on the 3rd. This species is a mainly winter visitor to the reserve, the summer being spent in its upland breeding habitat. The hen harrier has a mixed history in the UK. It was certainly more widespread in in the past, though persecution and habitat loss saw it become extinct on the UK mainland by 1900, with re-colonisation occurring after the Second World War. The current UK population is around 600 pairs, most of these in Scotland, and only extremely small numbers in England and the species is still threatened by human persecution in many parts of the country.

With the advancing year we are starting to see several signs of spring on the reserve. On Ternery Pool, we began to see noisy gatherings of black-headed gull from about mid-month, with at least 50 birds present by the 24th, while the first seven Mediterranean gull were seen on the 18th and on Harbour Farm a group of 27 avocet were present on the 24th. On the Beach Reserve, displaying ringed plover was regular by the end of the month while the occasional isolated pair of oystercatcher on Flat Beach and lapwing on Harbour Farm hinted at territories to be occupied during the spring.

Having said this there were still large numbers of what are typically winter birds present on the reserve during February. Peak counts of waterfowl included 1200 wigeon, 250 teal, 126 gadwall, 109 shoveler and 36 pintail, while ‘winter waders’ included 800 each of golden plover and lapwing, 365 curlew, 223 dunlin and 93 snipe, and passerines included regular fieldfare with a maximum of 54 at Castle Water on the 11th along with 28 redwing. Wildfowl highlights included a red-breasted merganser on Harbour Farm on the 9th, black-necked grebe on Ternery Pool on the 4th and 10th and white-fronted goose on Harbour Farm on the 4th (14) and 13th (10). There were also several sightings of bittern at Castle Water during the month, while great white egret currently seems to be a regular, with a number of sightings on Castle Water and Harbour Farm. Best of the bunch for the waders were jack snipe at Ternery Pool on the 2nd (five) and 10th (six) and several sightings of ruff with a maximum of 27 on Harbour Farm on the 18th.

Image: David Phillips

In addition to the hen harrier, raptors during February included a red kite over Harbour Farm on the 15th, merlin on the 2nd (Beach Reserve) and 10th (Harbour Farm), two peregrine on the 14th at Castle Water and on Harbour Farm, a small number of buzzard sightings and regular marsh harrier. Offshore there were regular sightings of red-throated diver (with a maximum of 180 on the 13th), the occasional guillemot (with a maximum of 450+, again on the 13th), 12 razorbill on the 4th and 35 gannet on the 9th.

Leave a comment
Time Δ Debug Message - Perch Runway 3.2
1783574762.29970 [906] SELECT p.pagePath, pr.routePattern, pr.routeRegExp, p.pageTemplate, pr.routeOrder, s.settingValue AS siteOffline FROM swt_pages_staging p LEFT JOIN swt_page_routes pr ON p.pageID=pr.pageID LEFT JOIN swt_settings s ON s.settingID='siteOffline' UNION SELECT NULL AS pagePath, pr2.routePattern, pr2.routeRegExp, pr2.templatePath AS pageTemplate, pr2.routeOrder, NULL AS siteOffline FROM swt_page_routes pr2 WHERE templateID!=0 ORDER BY routeOrder ASC, pagePath ASC
1783574762.33020.0304Matched route: news/[slug:s]
1783574762.33030.0001Server address: 216.73.216.62
1783574762.33030Using master page: /templates/pages/blog/post.php
1783574762.33030Page arguments: 
Array
(
    [0] => /news/february-2017-rye-harbour-nature-reserve-sightings
    [s] => february-2017-rye-harbour-nature-reserve-sightings
    [1] => february-2017-rye-harbour-nature-reserve-sightings
)
1783574762.33060.0003 [1] SELECT * FROM swt_pages_staging WHERE pagePath='/news/post' LIMIT 1
1783574762.33160.001 [86] SELECT DISTINCT settingID, settingValue FROM swt_settings WHERE userID=0
1783574762.33340.0018 [1] SELECT locationID FROM swt_shop_tax_locations WHERE locationIsHome=1 LIMIT 1
1783574762.33410.0007INSERT INTO swt_shop_cart(memberID,locationID,currencyID,cartPricing,cartProperties) VALUES(NULL,'1',47,'standard','[]')
1783574762.33630.0022 [1] SELECT * FROM swt_shop_cart WHERE cartID=22809609
1783574762.33710.0008 [1] SELECT * FROM swt_shop_cart WHERE cartID=22809609
1783574762.33770.0006 [nil] SELECT * FROM swt_shop_sales WHERE saleFrom<='2026-07-09 05:26:00' AND saleTo>'2026-07-09 05:26:00' AND saleActive=1 AND saleDeleted IS NULL ORDER BY saleOrder ASC
1783574762.33910.0015 [1] SELECT SQL_CALC_FOUND_ROWS DISTINCT tbl.* FROM ( SELECT idx.itemID, main.*, idx2.indexValue as sortval FROM swt_blog_index idx JOIN swt_blog_posts main ON idx.itemID=main.postID AND idx.itemKey='postID' JOIN swt_blog_index idx2 ON idx.itemID=idx2.itemID AND idx.itemKey='postID' AND idx2.indexKey='_id' WHERE 1=1 AND ((idx.indexKey='postSlug' AND idx.indexValue='february-2017-rye-harbour-nature-reserve-sightings')) AND idx.itemID=idx2.itemID AND idx.itemKey=idx2.itemKey GROUP BY idx.itemID, idx2.indexValue, postID ) as tbl WHERE (postStatus='Published' AND postDateTime<='2026-07-09 05:26:00' ) GROUP BY itemID, sortval ORDER BY sortval ASC LIMIT 0, 10
1783574762.34110.002 [1] SELECT FOUND_ROWS() AS `count`
1783574762.34170.0005 [1] SELECT * FROM swt_blog_posts WHERE postID=1298 AND postStatus='Published' AND postDateTime<='2026-07-09 05:26:00'
1783574762.34270.001 [13] SELECT * FROM swt_blog_sections ORDER BY sectionTitle ASC
1783574762.34340.0008 [1] SELECT * FROM swt_blogs ORDER BY blogTitle ASC
1783574762.34490.0015 [1] SELECT * FROM swt_categories WHERE catID=70 LIMIT 1
1783574762.34550.0007 [1] SELECT * FROM swt_categories WHERE catID=36 LIMIT 1
1783574762.3460.0005 [1] SELECT * FROM swt_categories WHERE catID=66 LIMIT 1
1783574762.34660.0006Using template: /templates/blog/post.html
1783574762.34690.0004 [162] SELECT catID, catPath FROM swt_categories
1783574762.34780.0009 [1] SELECT * FROM swt_blog_posts WHERE postStatus='Published' AND postDateTime<='2026-07-09 05:26:00' AND postSlug='february-2017-rye-harbour-nature-reserve-sightings'
1783574762.36930.0215Using template: /templates/blog/post.html
1783574762.37010.0008 [250] SELECT country, countryID FROM swt_shop_countries WHERE countryActive=1 ORDER BY country ASC
1783574762.37170.0016Using template: /templates/pages/attributes/seo.html
1783574762.37190.0002 [1] SELECT regionID, regionTemplate, regionPage, regionRev AS rev FROM swt_content_regions WHERE regionKey='Banner image' AND (regionPage='/news/post' OR regionPage='*')
1783574762.3730.0011 [nil] SELECT * FROM ( SELECT idx.itemID, c.regionID, idx.pageID, c.itemJSON, idx2.indexValue as sortval FROM swt_content_index idx JOIN swt_content_items c ON idx.itemID=c.itemID AND idx.itemRev=c.itemRev AND idx.regionID=c.regionID JOIN swt_content_index idx2 ON idx.itemID=idx2.itemID AND idx.itemRev=idx2.itemRev AND idx2.indexKey='_order' WHERE ((idx.regionID=104 AND idx.itemRev=0)) AND idx.itemID=idx2.itemID AND idx.itemRev=idx2.itemRev ) as tbl GROUP BY itemID, pageID, itemJSON, sortval, regionID ORDER BY sortval ASC
1783574762.37440.0014 [82] SELECT * FROM swt_pages_staging WHERE pageNew=0 AND pageHidden=0 AND pageDepth >=0 AND pageDepth<=2 ORDER BY pageTreePosition ASC
1783574762.37740.003 [1] SELECT pageTreePosition FROM swt_pages_staging WHERE pagePath='/news/post' LIMIT 1
1783574762.3780.0006 [2] SELECT pageID FROM swt_pages_staging WHERE pageTreePosition IN ('000-006-001', '000-006', '000') ORDER BY pageTreePosition DESC
1783574762.38030.0023Using template: /templates/navigation/ps_nav_template.html
1783574762.38030 [6] Using template: /templates/navigation/ps_nav_template_children.html
1783574762.38110.0008 [4] Using template: /templates/navigation/ps_nav_template_children.html
1783574762.38160.0005 [29] Using template: /templates/navigation/ps_nav_template_children.html
1783574762.38460.003 [10] Using template: /templates/navigation/ps_nav_template_children.html
1783574762.38570.0011 [7] Using template: /templates/navigation/ps_nav_template_children.html
1783574762.38650.0008 [9] Using template: /templates/navigation/ps_nav_template_children.html
1783574762.38950.003 [1] SELECT pageTreePosition FROM swt_pages_staging WHERE pagePath='/news/post' OR pageSortPath='/news/post' LIMIT 1
1783574762.39050.001 [1] SELECT * FROM swt_pages_staging WHERE pageHidden=0 AND pageNew=0 AND pageTreePosition IN ('000-006-001', '000-006', '000') ORDER BY pageTreePosition
1783574762.39260.0021 [1] Using template: /templates/navigation/breadcrumbs.html
1783574762.39310.0005Using template: /templates/blog/post.html
1783574762.39340.0003 [1] SELECT * FROM swt_blog_authors WHERE authorID='9' LIMIT 1
1783574762.39420.0008Using template: /templates/blog/author.html
1783574762.39460.0004 [1] SELECT SQL_CALC_FOUND_ROWS DISTINCT tbl.* FROM ( SELECT idx.itemID, main.*, idx2.indexValue as sortval FROM swt_blog_index idx JOIN swt_blog_posts main ON idx.itemID=main.postID AND idx.itemKey='postID' JOIN swt_blog_index idx2 ON idx.itemID=idx2.itemID AND idx.itemKey='postID' AND idx2.indexKey='_id' WHERE 1=1 AND ((idx.indexKey='postSlug' AND idx.indexValue='february-2017-rye-harbour-nature-reserve-sightings')) AND idx.itemID=idx2.itemID AND idx.itemKey=idx2.itemKey GROUP BY idx.itemID, idx2.indexValue, postID ) as tbl WHERE (postStatus='Published' AND postDateTime<='2026-07-09 05:26:00' ) GROUP BY itemID, sortval ORDER BY sortval ASC LIMIT 0, 1
1783574762.39670.0021 [1] SELECT FOUND_ROWS() AS `count`
1783574762.39720.0005 [1] Using template: /templates/blog/post.html
1783574762.40030.0031Using template: /templates/blog/comment_form.html
1783574762.40150.0012 [nil] SELECT * FROM swt_blog_comments WHERE 1=1 AND postID=1298 AND commentStatus='LIVE' ORDER BY FIELD(webmentionType, 'like', 'repost', 'comment', NULL) ASC, commentDateTime ASC
1783574762.45270.0512 [0] Using template: /templates/blog/comment.html
1783574762.45290.0002Using template: /templates/blog/post.html
1783574762.45310.0002 [1] SELECT * FROM swt_blog_authors WHERE authorID='9' LIMIT 1
1783574762.45410.001 [1] SELECT pageID, pageParentID, pageDepth, pageTreePosition FROM swt_pages_staging WHERE pagePath='/what-we-do' OR pageSortPath='/what-we-do' LIMIT 1
1783574762.45490.0008 [1] SELECT pageID, pageParentID, pageDepth, pageTreePosition FROM swt_pages_staging WHERE pageTreePosition='000-002' LIMIT 1
1783574762.45560.0007 [7] SELECT * FROM swt_pages_staging WHERE pageNew=0 AND pageHidden=0 AND pageTreePosition LIKE '000-002%' AND pageDepth >=1 AND pageDepth<=2 ORDER BY pageTreePosition ASC
1783574762.45810.0025 [1] SELECT pageTreePosition FROM swt_pages_staging WHERE pagePath='/news/post' LIMIT 1
1783574762.45880.0008 [2] SELECT pageID FROM swt_pages_staging WHERE pageTreePosition IN ('000-006-001', '000-006', '000') ORDER BY pageTreePosition DESC
1783574762.4610.0022 [6] Using template: /templates/navigation/footer-nav.html
1783574762.46240.0014 [1] SELECT pageID, pageParentID, pageDepth, pageTreePosition FROM swt_pages_staging WHERE pagePath='/make-a-difference' OR pageSortPath='/make-a-difference' LIMIT 1
1783574762.46320.0008 [1] SELECT pageID, pageParentID, pageDepth, pageTreePosition FROM swt_pages_staging WHERE pageTreePosition='000-005' LIMIT 1
1783574762.46380.0006 [38] SELECT * FROM swt_pages_staging WHERE pageNew=0 AND pageHidden=0 AND pageTreePosition LIKE '000-005%' ORDER BY pageTreePosition ASC
1783574762.46660.0027 [1] SELECT pageTreePosition FROM swt_pages_staging WHERE pagePath='/news/post' LIMIT 1
1783574762.46740.0009 [2] SELECT pageID FROM swt_pages_staging WHERE pageTreePosition IN ('000-006-001', '000-006', '000') ORDER BY pageTreePosition DESC
1783574762.46960.0022 [10] Using template: /templates/navigation/footer-nav.html
1783574762.47330.0037 [1] SELECT pageID, pageParentID, pageDepth, pageTreePosition FROM swt_pages_staging WHERE pagePath='/visit' OR pageSortPath='/visit' LIMIT 1
1783574762.47440.001 [1] SELECT pageID, pageParentID, pageDepth, pageTreePosition FROM swt_pages_staging WHERE pageTreePosition='000-004' LIMIT 1
1783574762.4750.0006 [30] SELECT * FROM swt_pages_staging WHERE pageNew=0 AND pageHidden=0 AND pageTreePosition LIKE '000-004%' AND pageDepth >=1 AND pageDepth<=2 ORDER BY pageTreePosition ASC
1783574762.47770.0027 [1] SELECT pageTreePosition FROM swt_pages_staging WHERE pagePath='/news/post' LIMIT 1
1783574762.47860.0009 [2] SELECT pageID FROM swt_pages_staging WHERE pageTreePosition IN ('000-006-001', '000-006', '000') ORDER BY pageTreePosition DESC
1783574762.48080.0023 [29] Using template: /templates/navigation/footer-nav.html
1783574762.48370.0028 [1] SELECT pageID, pageParentID, pageDepth, pageTreePosition FROM swt_pages_staging WHERE pagePath='/make-a-difference' OR pageSortPath='/make-a-difference' LIMIT 1
1783574762.48460.0009 [1] SELECT pageID, pageParentID, pageDepth, pageTreePosition FROM swt_pages_staging WHERE pageTreePosition='000-005' LIMIT 1
1783574762.48510.0005 [11] SELECT * FROM swt_pages_staging WHERE pageNew=0 AND pageHidden=0 AND pageTreePosition LIKE '000-005%' AND pageDepth >=1 AND pageDepth<=2 ORDER BY pageTreePosition ASC
1783574762.48740.0023 [1] SELECT pageTreePosition FROM swt_pages_staging WHERE pagePath='/news/post' LIMIT 1
1783574762.48830.0008 [2] SELECT pageID FROM swt_pages_staging WHERE pageTreePosition IN ('000-006-001', '000-006', '000') ORDER BY pageTreePosition DESC
1783574762.49030.0021 [10] Using template: /templates/navigation/footer-nav.html
1783574762.49160.0013Request time: 0.1931
1783574762.49170Process time: 0.1929
1783574762.49170Memory: 1.6304