Over the last few months many of you have been enjoying the sights and sounds of spring across Binfield including nesting birds and their fledglings. I have seen pictures and videos from across the parish of robins, blue tits, great tits and starlings rearing their first broods of the year. Some of these birds are using the nest boxes that people have put up in their gardens or that have been put up in public places. In addition to the species mentioned above, I have had reports of boxes in public places being used by squirrels, tree-creepers and jackdaws.
Please feel free to go out and see if you can find some of these boxes. As long as you don’t disturb anything that might be using them there is nothing to stop you watching from a safe distance and we would love to know what you see. Some of my favourite places around the village to watch bird boxes are Piglittle Copse (Amen Corner North), Farley Copse and Silver Jubilee Field (Wicks Green). There are also boxes in the new developments at Amen Corner North, Morshead Drive and Parkham Mead. Some species of birds will go on nesting up until August, so there’s plenty of time to see who is using these boxes. This is also why it is recommended that we don’t cut our hedges until September at the earliest.
There are also bat boxes around the parish. If you can’t see a bird sized hole in the front of the box then it is most likely that you are looking at a bat box. As it is illegal to disturb roosting bats, we can only work out if a box is being used by watching it at dusk or by using a bat detector to see if there are any bat calls coming from within the box. My two favourite places for spotting bats are Murrell Hill Lane and Wicks Green. The bats flitting around these lanes at treetop height are almost always common or soprano pipistrelles. There are plenty of bat boxes in or close to both lanes.
Other things to do this June include getting involved in Bracknell Forest Council’s Year of the Garden campaign, involving the whole family in 30 Days Wild, and improving your butterfly identification skills ahead of the 2020 Big Butterfly Count.
BFC have provided a great set of resources related to hedgehogs, swifts and bumblebees at http://www.digforbracknell.org.uk/yog.html along with information about the Year of the Garden scheme.
The wildlife trusts are running their annual 30 Days Wild campaign to encourage us all to do something different each day in June to experience and enjoy nature - https://www.bbowt.org.uk/30-days-wild.
Butterfly Conservation will be encouraging us to count butterflies in July and August, so now is the perfect time to get to know the species that make Binfield home - https://www.bigbutterflycount.org/.