Nature’s Top 40: Britain’s Best Wildlife

Roger Tidman

For most species of intertidal foragers, the usual peaks of feeding activity are on the ebbing and flowing tides, with something of a lull around low tide when many of the birds will roost for a while close to their feeding grounds. Feeding time for these birds is governed strictly by the availability of mud so, irrespective of whether it is day or night, they must feed when the tide is out. While feeding at night means there is less light in which the waders are able to spot their prey, this is compensated for by the fact that the invertebrates tend to be more active meaning that moonlit nights can often represent very rich pickings even for the plovers that hunt mostly by sight.

As the turning tide begins to flood in and cover the mud, the different species will be forced to crowd together as the mudflat steadily diminishes in size. The birds usually seem reluctant to leave these feeding areas for the high-tide roost, resulting in them often overlapping one another in a rippling Mexican wave effect up the estuary as progressively more mud becomes covered by the advancing tide. It is only when the last of the mud finally becomes covered that they are grudgingly forced to take to the air in a mass of whirring wings and amid much noise. When the birds rise as one it can be a spectacular sight, particularly if there are large numbers of knot present, like at Snettisham in Norfolk, as they pack very tightly together to form a huge, swirling smoke cloud for the, often short, hop across to their high-tide roost on the nearby gravel pits.

Waders choose their high-tide roost sites very carefully and tend to prefer sites that have a good all-round visibility, freedom from disturbance and shelter from the wind. The choice of roost usually ends up being a compromise, of course, as the most sheltered sites will invariably have poor visibility, but the favoured locations are usually tried and tested spots such as nearby fields, salt marsh or a remote section of beach above the tideline. Once the roosting birds finally settle, they adopt a posture to minimise heat loss, such as facing into the wind in order to avoid their feathers being ruffled, shortening their neck, tucking their bill under the feathers and standing on one leg. While the birds will undoubtedly sleep for short periods in the roost, they will often keep one eye open and alert for any potential danger. Should a peregrine approach the high-tide roost, for example, the waders will immediately assume an alert posture, with their necks extended and their wings held slightly away from their bodies so they can be ready to take to the air in evasive action. When the waders are forced to roost at night this can present a different problem, as they suddenly become more vulnerable to stealthy ground attacks; in this scenario they will often prefer to roost in shallow water to deter any terrestrial predators, such as foxes, allowing them see the sun rise over the mudflats another day.

33 Machair in summer (#ulink_78e24ed0-4ecc-518d-8722-b3cbba6c4cb2)

The word ‘machair’ comes from Gaelic and means an extensive low-lying and fertile plain. The term for this habitat encompasses everything from their white sandy beaches, to the calcium-rich dune pasture, to where the sand encroaches on to the peatlands further inland. Taking a walk along the machair in spring when the birds are calling, or in summer when there is the most incredible blaze of wild flowers is like taking a step back to the halcyon pre-industrialised days of farming on mainland Britain.

Machair

WHEN

Late May to August

WHERE

West coast of the Outer Hebrides, Tiree, Coll and other small Scottish beaches with a westerly aspect

The floral extravaganza that is the machair.

Bob Gibbons

With its precise requirements for formation and its localised nature, machair is one of the rarest habitats in Europe. In the British Isles, it is found only in the north and west of Scotland and western Ireland, of which almost half occurs along virtually the entire western fringe of the Outer Hebrides. The machair habitat as we know it today was formed at the end of the last Ice age after the melt water from the glaciers deposited enormous quantities of sand and gravel into the sea over what is now the Continental shelf. As the sea level rose, this glacial sediment, which became mixed with the crushed shells from marine molluscs, was then driven ashore by waves from the strong prevailing southwesterly winds to form the characteristic white beaches. Over time a constant supply of this sand caused some to be blown above the high-tide mark and began the formation of dunes. Centuries of constant wind has occasionally broken down these dunes, depositing this fine white sand on to the fields and pastures beyond, even blowing far enough inland to coat some of the peat bogs.

As machair sand is composed of 80 to 90 per cent crushed shells, these western beaches are white in colour, as opposed to the more typically yellow-coloured beaches on the eastern coasts of outer Hebridean islands, such as North Uist, where the sand is mostly from mineral-based material. Down below the sea line on beaches with a westerly aspect, the sand is repeatedly exposed to the action of the waves and wind meaning it is a highly mobile environment and devoid of any colonising plants, but just above the high-tide line the first few hardy, pioneering plants like sea rocket and sea sandwort begin to take hold. The very presence of these plants initiates the eventual formation of dunes: they provide a barrier to sand particles which then become deposited, and in turn create a bigger obstacle as more sand becomes accumulated by the plants as it is blown up the beach. The number one dune builder has to be marram grass, as its spiky inwardly rolled leaves, rapid growth rate, tussocky nature and deep root system mean that it can thrive in this harsh, sandblasted environment.

Behind these dunes – which can reach up to ten metres in height – the impact of the wind and salt spray are much reduced, meaning that a larger variety of plants are able to grow in the bare sand. As these plants decay over the seasons, the embryonic soil holds moisture a little more easily and the alkalinity is slightly lowered, meaning that plants such as butter-cups and lady’s bedstraw may be able to take hold, eventually forming meadows as the sand becomes habitable.

From the end of autumn until at least the middle of May, the machair has been described as a ‘desolate waste of sand’, but equally large areas of the machair can be flooded. This serves to protect these vulnerable grasslands from wind erosion and to provide rich feeding grounds for wintering wildfowl such as barnacle and Greenland white-fronted geese. Atlantic winter storms wash up a huge amount of kelp from just offshore and this forms an additional sea wall along the dune edge, which helps to protect the machair from being inundated by sea water. This kelp, or ‘tangle’, has been collected by the local population ever since Neolithic times as a natural fertiliser and 40 tonnes per hectare is still placed over the machair once it has drained each spring to improve the organic content. The fields are then ploughed to help bind the soil together and to improve its moisture-holding capacity, which in turn makes the grassland more resistant to wind erosion and ready for planting crops.

The corncrake, a.k.a. Crex crex. So repetitive they named it twice!

Derek Middleton

Spring generally arrives late on the machair because of cold easterly winds, but the application of the tangle, the ploughing, and careful grazing before the main growing season help create the perfect conditions for a vast array of wild flowers to grow alongside the planted oats, rye or barley crops. Strict field rotation is practised and, in some of the fallow areas, the floral diversity is so rich that it can reach an astonishing 45 species per square metre.

Early in the season the white confetti of daisies cover huge areas of machair; come June, the machair turns yellow as buttercups and bird’s-foot trefoil dominate in the drier areas, and silverweed, yellow rattle and marsh marigold thrive on the slightly wetter ground. Later in the summer the predominant colour tends to move to the red and purple end of the spectrum with red clover, ragged robin, self-heal and field scabious taking centre stage. The machair is also famous for its orchids, with pyramidal and fragrant orchids occurring in profusion alongside the unique Scottish marsh orchid at a number of sites on North Uist. The application of very low concentrations of herbicides means that, growing among the crops to be harvested, agricultural weeds, such as corn marigold and charlock that are all but extinct on the mainland, can be found.

This phenomenal floral diversity provides food and accommodation for a wide variety of invertebrates such as snails, grasshoppers, spiders, harvestmen and rare bumblebees, which, in turn, provide food for a range of agricultural birds that have declined massively on mainland Britain but of which the Outer Hebrides still have healthy populations. The machair and adjacent crofting lands on the Inner and Outer Hebrides have now become the last remaining strongholds of the corncrake, with recent surveys indicating that the islands may well hold at least 90 per cent of the British population of just under 600 calling males. This notorious skulker was difficult to see even in its heyday, when it could be heard repeating its strange rasping call up to 20,000 times a night all over rural Britain. Looking rather like a cross between a grey and rusty-coloured chicken and a moorhen, the corncrake began to decline on mainland Britain at the turn of the 20th century because of agricultural intensification. As hay fields were cut mechanically, the grass was cut earlier and removed for silage in early summer, the nests, young and even the adults disappeared rapidly. However, late cutting and the low-level of mechanisation is still commonplace in the Outer Hebrides today, which allows the corncrakes to hide in plentiful cover at harvest time, giving them a fighting chance. Grants and subsidies in return for good farm practice are also now available, and corncrake numbers seem to have started very slowly improving on the islands.

Other birds present in healthy numbers on the machair, while becoming rarer on the mainland, include corn bunting and twite. The lack of pesticides used on the crops means that there are plenty of beetles and caterpillars that birds can catch to feed their young. Also, after the harvest, the abundant fields of stubble and seeds from wild flowers ensure there is enough food for the birds to survive the winter as they rove the machair in their large flocks.

Of all the birds on the machair, the habitat is most famous for its breeding waders, with an estimated 17,000 pairs on the western fringes of the Uists and Barra alone. The most numerous breeding wader is the lapwing, but there are also large numbers of dunlin, ringed plover, oystercatcher, redshank and snipe. Because of the rich mosaic of habitats, the rotational form of agriculture and the lack of ground-based predators on the islands, these machair locations may well hold close to 40 per cent of the entire British breeding population of dunlin and close to a third of lapwing and ringed plover.

Curiously, the only recent threat to the waders has been the introduction of the hedgehog, as Miss Tiggywinkle has an unfortunate penchant for wader eggs. With efforts being made to tackle this problem, however, there is hope that the display calls of the lapwings, snipe and corncrake, in addition to the vast wild flower blooms, will be spectacles for many years to come in the land of the machair.

32 Wild goats rutting (#ulink_b84e98d3-a634-532e-bca0-00418b00a69c)

While watching wild goats negotiate the most terrifying vertical cliffs and sheer precipices with such adroitness in places like Snowdonia, it is hard to believe that these hardy beasts only exist in some of our wildest places thanks to a helping hand from prehistoric man. These descendants of the original domesticated goat stock look as much part of the scenery as the drystone walls that weave up and down the mountainsides.

Wild goats

WHEN

October and November for the rut, although the goats will be resident all year round

WHERE

Snowdonia, North Wales; Lundy Island; Valley of the Rocks, Lynton, Devon

Since having been introduced, goats now seem part of the furniture in some of our wildest places.

Alan Williams

Feral goats in Britain are confined to mountainous districts, cliff tops and islands; they are widespread in Scotland, and occur locally in a few remote locations across northern England and Wales. Perhaps the best-known and most easily encountered population is the famous feral goats of Snowdonia. With the red deer long since exterminated from Wales’s most famous national park, it is curious that the only remaining large herbivore that is both tough and canny enough to survive in this unforgiving landscape, is an introduced goat.

It is thought that goats were originally introduced to North Wales when Neolithic man first crossed the Channel to colonise Britain from mainland Europe over 5,000 years ago, bringing his domesticated livestock, such as goats from the Middle East, with him. Then, around 1,500 years ago, during the Iron Age, the farmers are believed to have taken their goats into the mountains to feed and the animals’ descendants are thought to have stayed ever since.

For many centuries the goats held sway as they were used for their hair, hide, milk and meat; even up to the Middle Ages, goats were believed to have been more abundant than sheep, as they were able to graze the precipitous crags to the exclusion of less sure-footed and often more valuable cattle. It was not really until the 19th century that goat numbers began to decline as sheep numbers began to rise, due in part to the high demand for wool. By this time, however, many of the goats had become feral and the wild population was bolstered by escaped goats or those that were let loose once no longer needed.

The wild Snowdonia goats of today most closely resemble breeds that have not been seen in domestic herds for over 100 years, meaning they have considerable historical and cultural value, in addition to being an integral part of the local wildlife. The goats are in small clusters around the park, with well-known herds existing on the Glyders, around Beddgelert, on the Moelwyns and the Rhinogs; since these groups are largely isolated, this has resulted in subtle differences in appearance between the herds.

The feral male goat or billy is an imposing sight, reaching 90 centimetres at the shoulder and weighing between 45 and 55 kilograms, with the main difference between the wild version and the domesticated goat being that the wild goat has much longer hair, enabling it to tough out the worst possible Welsh weather. The females, or nannies, are much smaller, attaining a height of no more than 70 centimetres at the shoulder, with shorter hair and weighing approximately half the weight of their male counterparts. The coat colour of the males is generally piebald with black or brown blotches, but some can be entirely grey or black all over. The females, however, are usually much whiter and can be picked out among the rock scree at distance and can also be distinguished from the sheep as they only appear as pale as the goats when they are freshly shorn.

Apart from the obvious size difference, the sexes can be easily distinguished by their respective sets of horns: mature males have a large set of curled horns which can curve back towards the centre; the females’ are thinner, straighter and more pointed. Both sexes grow rings around their horns (although they are more prominent on the male) with each ring representing a year’s growth and the distance between the rings decreasing in the oldest goats. Unlike the antlers of red deer, which are shed after the rut and then regrown every summer, if the goat breaks its horns they will not grow back. Males that have lost their horns generally compensate of being heavier than the horned billies of an equivalent age. Both sexes also have the celebrated ‘goatee’ beards, although the tuft on the males is usually not to be as visible within their long coat.

The goats in Snowdonia tend to stay on the high ground most of the year, only descending during really harsh weather. The females spend most of their time in small groups of three to six within the boundaries of their home range, while the males will wander larger distances so they can visit and monitor several female groups. However, during the breeding season in September and October, much larger aggregations will form, making this the best time to look for these naturally wary animals as they drop their guard slightly while mating.

Brief fights are common between the males as they jostle for the right to mate with the nannies, but the most prolonged scraps occur when two males of a similar age and horn size meet hoof to hoof, with the reward of a group of receptive nannies going to the winner. In a scene more reminiscent of primeval fighting ibex in the Alps, the two evenly matched billies will then rise up on their rear legs before clashing their horns together with full force a number of times. In addition to the head-butting, they will also engage in wrestling and pushing matches more commonly seen among red stags, as each billy tries to assert control and gain the all-important mating rights.

After mating, the goats will wander much less during winter as they devote their attentions to searching out food, with their multi-purpose horns sometimes being used to scrape away snow to access the vegetation below. The goats will of course know their home ranges well and, when the weather is particularly inclement, they may well rest in favourite retreats in among the crags or scree slopes until conditions improve. The female groups stay together until the end of February, when the mothers will peel away to give birth to a single kid of two to three kilograms in among the rough scree or rocky terrain.

The kid is left hidden for the first couple of weeks, with the mother coming back several times during the day and night to suckle it, after which the kid joins the mother in the all-female group, where the two will keep in close contact by call until the youngster becomes weaned. It seems that climbing in the most precipitous areas is an inherent trait for goats and, in no time, the kid will have taken to the cliffs and the scree slopes like a duck to water. Very occasionally twins are born, but, in such a demanding environment and with the mother only able to produce a certain amount of milk, it is very rare for both to survive.

For good or bad, these hugely adaptable and resilient animals seem here to stay.

Bill Coster

The number of goats within the Snowdonia National Park has increased over the last 30 years from a relatively stable number of between 250 and 320 to around 500 goats, making them easier to track down now than for a generation. It is thought that this increase may well be due to the recent run of mild winters, and, with climate change affecting mountainous environments perhaps more strongly than elsewhere, their numbers are predicted to increase, causing a knock-on effect of too much grazing unless the population is kept in check.

Contrary to popular opinion, there seems little competition between goats and sheep for food, as the goats predominantly graze on woody, shrubby and coarse-leaved plants such as the bark from trees and the leaves of heather and bilberry in areas that the sheep may not be able to reach. The goats, however, are capable of causing considerable damage to trees by bark stripping and browsing, and, where this has happened in some of the important woodland sites on the lower slopes, they have had to be immediately removed. Undoubtedly, the goats have also caused resentment among local farmers as they steal the mixed-feed left out for the sheep and damage drystone walls. All interested parties, therefore, agree that the numbers of goats will have to be carefully controlled in order to achieve a healthy and balanced population that will harmoniously coexist with, rather than overgraze, the environment.

While unquestionably non-native, the goats have a place in both the cultural heritage and ecology of some of our most treasured wild locations. So, if you enjoy both high-octane wildlife behaviour and being in the mountains, then the feral goats could run the Alpine ibex a very close second!

31 Swallows and martins feeding (#ulink_30fefc24-126e-50da-91c9-388a173f0a53)