HOTELIERS AND TRADERS COMBINE TO SAFEGUARD WELFARE OF NESTING MARTINS

The Kingsway hotel where refurbishment is currently underway

PROSPECTS look bright for a family of house martins - a tiny migratory species - that has made its  home on the front wall of a hotel on Cleethorpes seafront.

Since flying to the resort in spring from their winter home in Africa, they have built their mud nest under the eaves of  The Kingsway hotel.

Following a change of ownership, the hotel currently has no guests (apart from the birds) pending a complete facelift.

But the nest became vulnerable to disturbance (or even complete removal) following the arrival last week of tradesmen including Grimsby firm Alturn Scaffolding and Cleethorpes based window installers Rapide Frame Supplies.

However, they have all  have taken the tiny birds to their hearts as have The Kingsway's owners, David and Jennifer Christian.

Everyone is working round the health and safety of the martins as the parents flit to and from the nests with insects to feed the chicks.

The hope is that, within the next week or so, the chicks will have fledged successfully ready to  join their parents on the long migration - which includes crossing the Sahara desert - to southern Africa.

The progress of the house martins - which are smaller relatives of swallows -  is being monitored by the Lincolnshire Bird Club which records the population and distribution of the county’s birds 

"This is a very special species," says a club official. "Cave-dwelling pre-historic man  first learned how to build houses by watching what house martins did with mud. 

"It’s great that both the hotel owners and the traders have been so keen to safeguard this particular pair - a perfect example of industry working hand-in-hand with nature."     

                                 

What's going on here? One of the parent birds checks that the coast is clear

And then flies up to the nest to feed the chicks (photo: courtesy Alturn Scaffolding)

The Grimsby News says: This is fantastic! In the same week that we reported how North East Lincolnshire Council is taking measures to prevent birds from nesting on the town halls in Grimsby and Cleethorpes, it emerges that the owners of The Kingsway and their contractors are taking the opposite approach - they are pulling out all the stops to protect birdlife,  specifically this tiny pair of house martins. Full marks to hoteliers David and Jennifer Christian,  Gareth Evans and Jordan Mussell  of Alturn Scaffolding and Tim Cattell and his team at Rapide.