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Jenny Wallace

It's been some time since the last entry on here - apologies for the long delay! We have had some recent staff changes here at Beckingham, with our previous Warden, Paul Bennett moving to pastures new over at our Coombes and Churnet Valley reserves in Staffordshire.

So without further ado, I would like to introduce myself as the new Warden for Beckingham. I know the site fairly well, having been involved with it for the last five years as part of my Assistant Warden role at Langford Lowfields. I am now taking over the Warden role for both sites and looking forward to getting to know Beckingham much better! I love birding and entomology, so will be posting about the site's recent bird sightings, insect discoveries and of course, will be keeping you all updated on reserve work.

So, now for a brief summary of the last two months....

  • Volunteers have finished coppicing an old hedge running along the eastern side of the field opposite the Willow Works. This work should regenerate the hedge nicely, making it better for a whole host of wildlife.
  • We have been improving the appearance of the site by removing old tree guards and canes where they are no longer needed, doing some well needed paint jobs (more to do!) and doing some fencing work.
  • Wednesday volunteer Mike and Joan recently spent a very successful day helping the local community maintaining the Willow Works Community Garden - an excellent local project detailing the history of the area.
  • The tree sparrow colony on site is looking set for another successful year (fingers crossed!), with large numbers of birds present on site at the end of the winter.
  • Good numbers of winter wildfowl including up to 200 wigeon, 50 teal and smaller numbers of mallard, gadwall and shoveler.
  • Woodcock and 350 golden plover have been wader highlights from the late winter period.
  • Yellow wagtail, wheatear, chiffchaff, skylark, meadow pipit, linnet and reed bunting on site and the first swallows in last week.
  • Insects emerging, including peacock, small tortoiseshell and brimstone butterflies.
  • And perhaps the biggest piece of news....recent visitors to the site may be wondering what the new fencing is in front of the viewing platform. This is in fact an anti-predator fence and is one of two we have recently had installed on site. The fence is designed to protect breeding waders from terrestrial predators such as foxes and badgers and will hopefully make a big difference to productivity of our lapwings. And the good news is that 10 pairs are currently making breeding attempts on site - fingers crossed for their success and I will be sure to keep you posted. More on the predator fence soon....

Lapwing - hopefully enjoying good breeding success here at Beckingham this year. Andy Hay (rspb-images.com)