July

Well, that’s everything done at our Scottish demonstration farm for another year! Another busy breeding season for the waders is winding down and coming to a close. While we had large numbers of returning birds (with a maximum pre-breeding count of 164 lapwing, larger than both the 2021 & ’22 seasons), we did have fewer nests than in previous years. 

A walk around GWSDF Auchnerran would not be complete without resident buzzards and red kites. We are lucky enough to be visited by an incredibly diverse range of raptor species, such as hen harriers, sparrowhawks and goshawks. Recently, we have witnessed a drastic increase in the number of raptors of various species observed utilising the farm, based on data from our raptor monitoring transects (conducted monthly since 2018).