Report from 18 to 21 June 2023

It was a quiet week at La Cassinazza. A dozen Teal were new arrivals, and we did find a rarity: La Cassinazza’s third-ever record of Gull-billed Terns. The month of June is an excellent time to catch up with wandering terns: in the space of seven days we saw four species, in addition to our local Common Terns.

Our three local White Stork nests now host seven chicks: respectively two, two, and three. The young will fledge in a couple of weeks, and perhaps earlier for one of the nests. I assume the juvenile Goshawks have also fledged, as the timing would be right and the nest seems empty. Neither adults nor juveniles were seen all week.

Purple Herons are watchful parents, and never leave their chicks unattended in the nest. When they are out foraging they do their best to be inconspicuous, and could easily pass for a dead branch that fell in the reeds. It is only when they are in the privacy of their own home that they display the magnificence of their breeding plumage. They look so different that they deserve two photographs.