Dee Estuary

Written by Matthew Scarborough, Burton Mere Wetlands residential volunteer

One of the best things about living on a nature reserve is that you’re always a few steps away from seeing amazing things. As a birder it has been such a pleasure to be able to just step out outside and be surrounded by birds and wildlife, some of which are quite scarce in the UK.
The most reliable spectacle that I see get to see every day…

Written by Matthew Scarborough, Residential volunteer.

Recent sightings

A wild weather week with all sorts of weather conditions from sleety rain to warm still sunshine has been reminding us that spring isn’t too far away now!

Great white egrets have been seen every day this week mixed in with the usual daily sightings of little egret and grey herons fishing in pools around the reserve. Some days all three of them…

Recent sightings

The week has been wild yet wonderful! Thankfully the weather did not put off the wildlife or the visitors. 

On Tuesday all the pink-footed geese that were feeding out on the fields past the Bunker Hide decided to head out to the marsh round about high tide time. It was slightly unusual to see them head out on mass in the middle of the day but fantastic to see them as they flew right over the Visitor Centre…

A little update to let you know how I'm getting on as a residential volunteer at Burton Mere!

Written by Matthew Scarborough

Recent sightings

The wetlands here provide us with many daily spectacles and this week we have had the usual fantastic variety and views of raptors. Common sights are soaring buzzards and sparrowhawks as you arrive at the reserve and kestrels just outside the Visitor Centre hovering very obligingly for photographers. Most days we also have marsh harriers quartering over the marsh and reedbed as…

Recent sightings

A week of beautiful wildlife much like the last with a couple unusual visitors that turned up, see my star sightings to find out who!

Still hanging around most of the week was the great egret, one showing well on the Reception Pool then up to seven seen at Inner Marsh Farm Hide. Great to see little egret and grey heron with the great egret, brilliant to watch them interacting with each other as they all…

Written by and posted on behalf of Katie Ellis and Matthew Scarborough

Recent sightings

A week of fairer weather has brought out lots of winter wildlife and lots of visitors too. 

Waders and ducks are still in abundance across the reserve with good numbers of black-tailed godwit, dunlin, redshank, lapwing, snipe, ruff, curlew, shelduck , teal, wigeon, pintail, gadwall, tufted duck and shoveler. Good numbers of geese have…

Recent sightings

 

Its been a fantastic week with everything from robins starting to sign again to the classic Winter visitors still showing well like (ringtail) hen harriers at Burton Mere Wetlands.

This week’s sightings have been for everyone from the novice to the more experienced wildlife watchers starting their new list for 2020 or just simply coming getting for a nice walk and some fresh air.

The waders this…

Posted on behalf of Katie Ellis

 

Recent sightings

Waders have been on top form this week with lots of the expected types of birds seen including dunlin, ruff, redshank, black-tailed godwit, curlew and golden plover residing on the scrape and over at Inner Marsh Farm hide. We’ve also been treated to sightings of up to 7 spotted redshanks on the scrape and a green sandpiper was seen at the end of the day on Friday. Flocks of la…

Happy New Year to everyone from the Dee Estuary team.

It has been a brilliantly busy start to our year at Burton Mere Wetlands. For starters this week we’ve had the water pipit that had been somewhat elusive in December, now a good spot to look out for it is from the Gorse Covert Woodland. From the bench there is a view looking across to the farmers muck heaps where it seems to like to hide behind. Spotted redshan…

I have been here now for 15 months and I’m loving it now more than ever!

 

My favourite project while working at the Dee has been managing the Point of Ayr nature reserve. As assistant warden I get to organise allot of the management there. This year that involved the Winter Wardening Scheme and carrying out Breeding Bird Surveys and managing the little tern project there.

This year at the Point of Ayr was the best…

 This weeks blog was written by Matthew Scarborough our newest residential volunteer.

Recent sightings

Here at Burton Mere Wetlands we’ve had another excellent week for wildlife. Our resident stoat seems even more active than usual and has been spotted quite a few times this week leaping around the wetland.

It has been another great week for raptors with regular sightings of marsh harriers, buzzards and kestrels

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It’s been a while since we’ve had an update from Woolston Eyes, so here’s a 2019 round-up from me (Dan Gornall):

 

Breeding season round-up:

All in all it was a great breeding season for the Eyes. Perhaps the highlight was the reserve's first ever breeding record of garganey and the first confirmed breeding in Cheshire since 1975! Black-necked grebes had a good year, with 10 fully fledged young being…

Recent sightings

Wet and windy sums up the week! Nevertheless the wildlife at Burton Mere Wetlands is here to cheer us up in times of gloom.

So despite the weather, the waders and wildfowl have not disappointed. Out the back on the wet grassland area the waders have great wet habitat to feed on, so a lot of them are spending time out there. The main scrape thankfully has still had some gems like dunlin, ruff, spotted reds…

 This weeks blog was written by Matthew Scarborough our newest residential volunteer.

Recent sightings

Here at Burton Mere Wetlands we’ve had a great week for all sorts of birds. For waders there has been lovely views of thousands of lapwings as well as black-tailed godwit, curlew, dunlin, golden plover, ruff, redshank and snipe across the reserve but particularly well straight from the Visitor Centre.

Winter wildfowl…

Posted on behalf of Matt, our newest residential volunteer.

Hello there, I’m Matthew Scarborough. A young and driven conservationist with a love for the outdoors and everything in it. My journey has brought me here to the amazing Burton Mere Wetlands where I’ll be a residential volunteer for the foreseeing months.

                                                                      
                                                                Stood outside Burton Mere Visitor…

Recent sightings

Even with the slightly soggy and dank weather we’ve still been having some wonderful wildlife spectacles. It was waders galore on Thursday, with over 100 golden plover, 50+ dunlin, ruff, spotted redshank, 40+ snipe, over 4000 lapwing and over 1400 black-tailed godwit counted across the wet grassland and main scrape from the Bunker Hide area. 

Three bearded tits have been seen again on Wednesday first…

Recent sightings

Grab your binoculars, help yourself to a cuppa, and settle in for a frosty but fantastic week at Burton Mere Wetlands!

This week was off to a promising start on Monday, greeting us on the reserve with a crisp autumnal day and great visibility throughout, topped off by a stunning starling murmuration against a sublime sunset in the evening. The scrape was well-populated by black-tailed godwits and other waders…

Written by, and posted on behalf of volunteer Eliza...

Recent sightings

Slightly lower water levels on the main scrape have allowed the numbers of waders present to build up again, perhaps driven in by wet and windy weather. There are good numbers of black-tailed godwit showing alongside a few ruff, and a solitary green sandpiper was spotted at the back of the scrape. Plenty of teal are present as usual with shoveler and…

Hello! I'm Jess, the new residential volunteer here at Burton Mere. This is my first blog post. Enjoy!

Recent sightings

It has been a great week with the cattle egret returning after going missing for a week and the same with the bittern down at Parkgate which was seen again Wednesday. Parkgate can be a great spot at this time of year. If you head down late afternoon you may be lucky enough to spot the bittern coming into roost in the reedbed, along with short-eared owl, hen harrier and marsh harrier.

Speaking of egrets…

Recent sightings

Last weekend's heavy rainfall left us with higher than usual water levels across much of Burton Mere Wetlands this week. As a result, wildfowl were the dominant presence, namely the usual variety of teal, shoveler, wigeon, pintail, gadwall, and shelduck. Plenty of waders were still present, just pushed onto the wet grassland in shallower water with over 1000 black-tailed godwit present, vast flocks…

Recent sightings

With the mostly mild weather we have had this week there have been some lovely days filled with migrant hawker and common darter dragonflies along with loads of comma and red admiral butterflies basking in the sunshine.

Visitors are still seeing water voles in the ditches and from Marsh Covert Hide. Another little mammal, a weasel was photographed with its dinner earlier in the week.

Linnet, siskin, stonechat…

Recent sightings

Considering the very unpredictable weather the last couple of weeks the wildlife has been great! Still have dragonflies and some butterflies around. Stoat sightings on the rise along with water voles!

Migrant hawker dragonfly: Paul Jubb

Much of the same fantastic birds around since the last few weeks. Inner Marsh Farm Hide is the place to see waders in great numbers like the black-tailed godwits and

…

Recent sightings

What a wonderful bit of sunshine we have had this week. It has meant splendid sightings of dragonflies and butterflies like common darter and one of my personal favourites speckled wood butterfly.

Still some great waders around too. Up to fifteen ruff on the main scrape, loads of snipe peppered across the reserve and at times two little stints almost always with a flock of dunlin. Other waders included;…