Bird of the month - August
	The Common Shelduck (Tadorna tadorna)
	At the beginning of August a nature phenomenom reaches its maximum, for that Trischen is known since many years: In remote spaces of the Wadden Sea there is a gathering of many thousands of Common Shelducks, which come here to moult.
	A Common Shelduck in the western mudflats of Trischen.
	Because they lost all their wing feathers at ttime, they can’t fly for 3 to 4 weeks and are very shy in this period. The growth of the feathers needs much energy so they have to start the moult with some fat reserves and need much calmness without disturbance through humans. The moult population of Trischen variated very much in the last years. In the 1980 up to 100.000 Common Shelducks gathered around Trischen, today about 20.000 stay for moult. In all it is the biggest part of the European population which come to the Dithmarscher Wadden Sea : 150.000 birds.
	But not only the guests for moult stay on Trischen. This year 56 pairs of Common Shelducks bread on the island. They prefer holes for breeding, especially those of rabbits. But because the last of the rabbits, which lived on the island since 1890 be drowned by a high tide in 1962, the Common Shelducks must take some own-digging tubes in the vegetation.
	Male and female stay together for the whole breeding season, but only the female breed out the 8-10eggs. After the chicks hatched out, the parents lead them to places with good food supply, on Trischen the bays in the eastern part of the island. There they search for little shells, worms and cancers.
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