CHELMSFORD & CENTRAL ESSEX GROUP NEWS Winter 2018/19 The RSPB is a registered charity in England & Wales 207076, in Scotland SC037654 VOLUNTEERING IS GOOD FOR NEW THOUGHTS ABOUT THE YOUR HEALTH TOO – OFFICIAL! WREN More good news following our headline in the Mike Logan Wood last issue that birdwatching is good for your The other day I was speaking to my sister in health – volunteering is good for you too. I Canada who happened to mention that all the wouldn’t be surprised if the majority of our wrens in Canada had migrated southwards into readers weren’t volunteers in some capacity or America as usual. I mused upon this for a another, or have been in the past, even if it isn’t while, mainly because we in England have, to bird-related. A recent study of volunteering and me, seemed so far north compared with places its impact on mental health carried out by the we know in Canada. Some investigation was Green Exercise Team at the University of needed. Essex found that over a 12-week period, My map tells me that London is on the same volunteers experienced a range of benefits, latitude as the northern tip of Newfoundland. such as increased feelings of positivity, higher New York – with Madrid, and Ottawa – with levels of physical activity, and improved mental Bordeaux. health. The researchers studied volunteers on Essex Wildlife Trust programmes, and found My American bird book shows me that there is that attendance was associated with health and a winter wren – Troglodytes troglodytes – the well-being improvements, particularly for people same as our wren, with the following note with low levels of well-being. The results of the “Range – boreal Canada extending northwards study are quite detailed and you can read more into Alaska, southwards along the Pacific coast. here: Movements – Canadian birds migrate https://www.wildlifetrusts.org/sites/default/files southwards to winter in southern and eastern /2018- states”. That seems to confirm the situation, 05/r3_the_health_and_wellbeing_impacts_of that Canada has a very much colder winter than _volunteering_with_the_wildlife_trusts_- we do. My book also tells me that there are _university_of_essex_report_3_0.pdf eight Canadian birds called wrens, only two of which are members of the Troglodytes family If we needed any more reasons to volunteer, but all look very similar and all of which migrate. this would be a good one. Some description of the Canadian wrens may Louise Fuller not go amiss:- House wren – Troglodytes aedon – a widespread and common small wren with short cocked tail and faintly barred pale plumage Bewick’s wren – Thryomanes bewickii – commonest in the west but declining. Sideways jerking of white fringed tail Carolina wren – Thryoyhorus ludovicianus – commonest in south-east except after severe frost. Broad white eyestripe Cactus wren – Campylorhynchus brunneicapillus – giant wren of the deserts; flies low; brown spotted, white striped eye Rock wren – Salpinctes obsoletus . No other wren has light streaking on breast. Bobs as it walks VOLUNTEERS TREE PLANTING Canyon wren – Catherpes mexicanus . Clear white throat and breast 1 Marsh wren – Cistothorus palustris . Brown cap 11.5cm x 4.5cm). This worked out at 2.5 cubic with white stripe. Always close to or in marshes inches (38 c.cm) per bird. Sedge wren – Cistothorus platensis . Scarce. Now perhaps we can consider the origins of An irregular migrant. Song soft and insect-like our wrens. There has been a tremendous Having sorted out the Canadian wrens, we amount of time and energy spent on looking at should not forget the fact that there are six our history and trying to find the origins of our wrens here in the British Isles which are as way of life. What have we got to use to time the follows: - arrival of a bird into our lives? Well, funnily Wren or winter wren – Troglodytes troglodytes enough, we have something called “The Wren – our common wren Cult”. You may remember that some time ago I Brown wren – T. T. indigenus . The continental wrote a piece about the event at Christmas bird, more marked on its breast with a little when men and boys would dress up and leave fatter bill. Seen in great numbers mixing with the village to walk its boundaries and shake the common bird trees to disturb a wren. If they found one they St Kilda wren – T. T. hertensis . Restricted to would stone it and kill it and hang it from a the island with about 200-230 pairs mixing with cross they had made and carry it back to the fulmars and puffins, conserved by the Wild village. There they would take it from door to Birds Protection (St Kilda) Act 1904 door and ask for alms. Fair Isle wren – T. T. fridariensis . Restricted to This has been found to be a very ancient the island and numbering 10 to 52 pairs. custom as it was tied in with the action between Darker pIumaged than the others. the eagle and the wren. You may remember Shetland wren – T. T. zetlandicus . Rufus and the time in religious history when the birds were strongly barbed plumage trying to find a king. It was going to be who Hebridean wren – T. T. hebridensis . Lives in could fly the highest. The golden eagle made it the Outer Hebrides and migrates to Ireland and was going to be awarded the prize when the wren popped out of the eagle’s feathers and won the day. This was the creation of the Wren Cult which has been found to have arrived in Great Britain in the Bronze Age and was carried by megalith builders whose cultural inspiration came from either the Mediterranean region or from southern America. Probably these folk cherished mainly solar religious beliefs. The Wren Hunt represents New Year ceremonial, having as its purpose the defeat of the dark earth powers and identification with the hoped- SHETLAND WREN for triumph of light and life. In Canada it was It also introduces me into methods our wrens the wren itself that carried the message by use to overcome particularly cold winters. They following the expansion of plant growth may gather at dusk in communal roosts, which northwards as the temperature rose as the are the more impressive given the wren’s earth warmed. The wrens followed this spread otherwise solitary anti-social lifestyle. Squirrel north and then east via Greenland and Iceland dreys (there is a record of at least 17 in one) before turning south to join the expansion in and old birds’ nests including those of swallow, Great Britain in the Bronze age. song thrush (12 birds) and house martin (30+) 26 December 2018 have been recorded. 10 wrens in a coconut If you would like to find out more try: “Folklore shell was more unusual, whilst the biggest ever of Birds” by Edward A Armstrong, part of the was a gathering of many dozens between New Naturalist Series by Collins January and March in 1979 in the roof eves of a cottage at Lydney, in Gloucester. They arrived 25 to 40 minutes from dusk to dark and at the same time they were lining up to enter. OUR COMMON WREN Perhaps the most remarkable of all, given the confined nature of the space, was a gathering at High Kelling, Norfolk of over 60 birds in a nest box measuring 5.5” x 4.5” x 0.5” (14cm x 2 OUR LOCAL GROUP WALK IN DECEMBER TO WALLASEA RSPB GOODS ISLAND RSPB RESERVE Report by Stuart Anderson FROM THE RSPB CATALOGUE AND We were pleased that Jeff Delve, local expert WEBSITE on the reserve, was able to guide our walk. He FREE DELIVERY TO YOUR DOOR was a mine of information on the history and background of the reserve, in addition to his POSTAGE FREE ability to spot and identify the many birds we saw. Fifteen of us met in the morning, greeted FOR FULL DETAILS CALL by a brisk, cold, north-westerly wind. From the car park we had good views of a corn bunting JEAN WILCOX before we climbed the steps onto the river wall and headed east with the River Crouch on our 01245 262452 left. Allfleets Marsh lies between the footpath AND SUPPORT THE CHELMSFORD and the old river wall. This was created by DEFRA as part of a habitat compensation GROUP scheme following the loss of habitats in Felixstowe and Harwich Docks area. Silts were pumped between the river walls before the old wall was breached in 2006 creating this new The majority continued, passing the 165 marsh which has now developed a wide range hectare Jubilee Marsh on our left. The sea wall of plants. The tide was coming in and there was breached in 2015, and again this is really was a good variety of waders and ducks albeit progressing in its development with over 100 at some distance. avocets nesting in 2018. We finally reached the To our right was Pool Marsh where again we River Roach and had a brief respite from the saw a variety of waders and ducks, including wind in one of the new shelters before turning wigeons and grey plovers, and several west and following the river flood wall. It could thousand golden plovers and lapwings taking to clearly be seen how much higher the sea level the sky beyond. It is hoped that in the long is above the marsh level. The former arable term spoonbills will be attracted to this area. fields yielded their final harvest in 2018 before We continued on the seawall, passing over the they formed saline lagoons as part of an conveyor system which was used to transfer engineered, regulated tidal exchange with the some three million tonnes of clay tunnelled from opening of the last sluice gates in November the London Crossrail project.