An update on the Goosander I mentioned in my last post. On checking this afternoon the female Goosander has left with 10 young. The remarkable thing about it is that it's bred in a 5 gallon plastic barrel that has been adapted for Tawny Owls, and it's approximately half a mile from any water body.

We have 25 pairs of Tawny Owl breeding this year equalling our best ever total. We have at least 46 young which is our best ever breeding record. 23 pairs are in the Bury area while 2 pairs are in Bolton.

Many thanks must go to Rob Archer for all of his help, otherwise this years survey wouldn't have been possible.

We also have a Goosander in an owl box, which I have checked 3 times in the last 4 weeks, including this morning and she is still in there. Hopefully by next weekend she will have successfully fledged the young.

My final total of breeding pairs is 25, 2 of which are out of Greater Manchester. Of the 23 pairs in Greater Manchester there was at least 33 young. I don't start checking until around the 1st May, and I'm of the opinion that 4 pair had bred and their young fledged by the time I did my first visit. I erected 2 boxes at one site on 31st January and had 3 young in each which was excellent.

The most breeding pairs I have had in the past in one season was 25 and I was surprised to equal that this year after such a bad winter.

Also this year I have had 7 pair of Kestrel breeding in boxes I have provided for them, producing 22 young. Sadly 1 of the 4 young at Elton was found dead in a water trough. This is the most breeding pairs I have ever had, again despite the bad winter.

I also had 2 pair of Little Owl this year with 3 young in each box.

thats good news there are so many breeding, i have been hearing tawny owls calling at night in the bradley fold trading estate which is just about in the bury area this winter, not heard them for about a month now though

Not in the Bury area but there was a BBC news article which came across on the net on friday of a Tawny Owl bringing up a couple of Mandarin ducklings in the Stockport area!

-- Edited by Simon Johnson on Sunday 16th of May 2010 04:24:10 PM

I expected poor results from our Tawny Owl breeding programme this year, due to the bad weather over winter. The results are much better than anticipated. This year I have 23 pair with 30 young so far. There's still 5 boxes I need to revisit in order to check the status of eggs / young. I have had 2 pair with 4 young each, 1 of them being out of the county in Lancashire, which are the biggest broods this year. I had several boxes deserted with eggs, possibly due to human disturbance. There was also quite a few boxes inhabited by squirrels.