Tales of the Riverbank

In April last year there were two spates on the Tyne, the second one was quite big and it destroyed the nests and eggs of both sets of swans at the Nungate Bridge and at Long Cram. The eggs at the Nungate Bridge were within a few days of hatching, however, within the next fortnight I witnessed the swans doing the graceful mating dance twice and they set about building a new nest on the bank behind Tyne Court and by 27^th May had laid six eggs of which three hatched but all died and three eggs were infertile. The swans spent nearly four months nesting and sitting on eggs to no avail. After they lost the second clutch the swans seemed to be completely disorientated with nothing to do.

I heard about a woman who rescued five ducks' eggs when the mother deserted the nest during the big spate in April. She took the eggs before the nest was about to be inundated with floodwater and incubated them at home. In May she hatched all five ducklings.

On 19^th May there was a great cloud of swallows feeding over the Tyne and by the next day they were all gone, they obviously had not reached home yet.

At the end of May I saw a swarm of bees covering a section of the wall on the Nungate Bridge. Some bairns were watching the swarm fascinated but a wee bit edgy.

The Waterside Bistro was flooded twice in August and the Tyne was in spate several times. One particularly bad one on 6^th-7^th November carried away a huge section of the riverbank on the north side of the Abbey Bridge. It was around one hundred feet long and twenty feet at its widest point, leaving the fisherman's footpath too dangerous to use. The banks of both Haughs (east and west) are being eroded away and are now sheer drops of 3 to 4 feet. It seems that the reason for this is the constant spates (two large and nine moderate in the last twelve months) probably due to global warming. The river was very low after the thaw in January as we had a good dry spell but before the end of February it was in spate again.

The saga of Snowy the duck came to end in October when it disappeared. Snowy had first appeared among the Mallards at the Nungate Bridge in the spring. He had been stolen from a farm near Garvald and when released on the Tyne joined the Mallard ducks. He was a cute wee thing and could hold his own against the wild Mallards and swans. When the swans were nesting they would chase him all the time because he was pure white with a yellow bill. I reckon they thought he was a wee swan and therefore a danger. His owners tried to capture him a couple of times in the summer and maybe with the winter closing in he was glad to bet back to his farm. Who knows!

During December I saw otters at the Nungate Bridge quite often, just after first light. You were alerted by the ducks squawking and flying to the opposite bank. Perhaps they thought it was a mink, which they are terrified of.

The bird visitors to the Nungate Bridge this winter were Grebes, Gooseanders and one Tufted duck, which didn't stay long.

I would like to make a plea to some of the young lads who go fishing not to dig up the banks looking for worms, not only is it unsightly but it is downright dangerous for walkers.

David J. Motherwell

February 2001