Recent sightings

As we reach the middle of breeding season, the most significant birds are the avocets, lapwings and redshanks nesting on the main scrape and surrounding wet grassland area, with chicks of all three very visible at times. As warden Al talked about in his recent blog, it’s looking like a good year!

A sizeable black-headed gull colony has formed on one of the scrape islands, with a pair of Mediterranean…

We’ve been having a wader spectacular down at Burton Mere Wetlands this year. Record numbers of Lapwing, Redshank and Avocet within our predator-exclusion fence, yet again.

Alasdair Grubb

We have 2 key management objectives on site here: Wintering Wildfowl and Breeding Waders. Obviously, at this time of year the waders take precedent.

Historically, lapwing and redshank have always bred on the reserve, but struggled…

Following Friday's guest blog from residential volunteer Gwen, her compatriot Alice here writes her account of her first few weeks in the role.

I’d like to start by introducing myself; my name is Alice and I am one of the new residential volunteers living at Burton Mere Wetlands. I will be here for six months and have the opportunity to work on both the visitor experience and the warden side of the reserve, which…

This guest blog comes from the first of our brand new residential volunteers, Gwen. They'll each be blogging regularly during their placement at the Dee this summer.

My name is Gwen and I am in the first set of long-term residential volunteers for the Dee Estuary reserve, based at Burton Mere Wetlands. I have been here for three weeks now and wanted to write a summary of all I have been up to so far! So much experience…

On Tuesday 1 May the reserve will be closed due to essential maintenance. We will be resurfacing the main track into the reserve. We will also be resurfacing the car park on Wednesday 2 May, the reserve will be open but with some restricted access. Apologies for any inconvenience.

Sunday hide guide volunteer, Tom, brings us a guest blog capturing the current feel of the reserve as we sailed past the spring equinox yet struggle to break the shackles winter.

Since the sun rose over the north pole ice as it traversed the equator, a surge of life has flowered on the reserve. The colour of Spring has burst as daffodils remind me of Easter. Less dazzling but just as welcome, the flowers of lesser celandine…

It's over three weeks since the arrival of our first spring avocet (16 February) and despite the cold week of the "Beast from the East" knocking back numbers temporarily, the count now sits at more than 50 of these majestic birds wading through the shallow water of Burton Mere Wetlands' main scrape. In addition since the welcome thaw last week, we have been seeing lapwings starting to perform courtship displays…

I'd like to start this post by letting you all know that spring is apparently cancelled this year and has been replaced with a snowy, blustery storm front.

Ok, so that is not strictly true. Considering spring isn't officially here until 20 March, then there's still a bit of time for this wintry weather to start cleaning up its act. Although I do sometimes wonder if the avocets have any egrets about arriving…

Following the Christmas break we were welcomed back to work with a strong storm co-inciding with a period of high tides. This created a fantastic spectacle around the whole estuary with thousands of waders and wildfowl forced off their saltmarsh roosts with hunting harriers and short-eared owls not far behind. But as always with these huge tides comes the clean up. Following on from Blue Planet II and the issues of plastic…

Ahhhhhh. The start of a new year. 2018. New beginnings, new possibilities, new resolutions. Must join that gym, eat better, don't eat the cake. Finish the project, be more productive, start that project I once thought about thinking when I thought of things way back when...

...or something?

Hey, it’s great to have goals, however, we too often set solid goals that are more like chores, rather than allowing ourselves…

Happy New Year to all the Dee Estuary’s followers! 2017 was a year to remember, with breeding cattle egret and a couple of good rarities in the shape of buff-breasted sandpiper in May and pallid harrier in September; let’s hope 2018 can match it!

We’ve barely drawn breath after a busy festive period which saw almost 1200 visitors pass through Burton Mere Wetlands’ doors, but we have an exciting…

Today is the winter solstice, the shortest day, which means the days will soon start getting longer and the optimists amongst us can start looking forward to spring! Of course, we have the small matter of Christmas to enjoy yet, so here’s a little round-up of what to expect if you visit the reserve over the festive season.

That’s right, Burton Mere Wetlands is open every day except Christmas Day (though don’t forget…

It’s that time of year again when the days get ever shorter and the weather a little more unpredictable but the wildlife spectacle just gets better and better! It’s also the time of year when a lot of management work gets carried out on the reserve.

In preparation for the forthcoming opening of Burton Mere Wetlands' garden, myself and a team of volunteers have been busy installing some new hardcore and…

It’s been a busy couple of weeks since my last Warden's Wanderings blog. Having been battered by a couple of storms and rounding up sheep on the saltmarsh before Ophelia hit, I am writing this on a brilliant autumn day – I didn’t plan that well!! The reserve always look great on a day like today with the autumn colours of browning reeds surrounded by mature broadleaf woodland makes the view towards Burton village a classic…

A Bird count with a difference!

Though we are based on the Dee Estuary, we do have a “small” land holding on the Mersey Estuary. I say small, it is still 1000 hectares, but small relative to our holding on the Dee.

Map of the estuary.

The Mersey Estuary is hugely important for water birds: Internationally important numbers of black-tailed godwit, dunlin, teal, turnstone, redshank, shelduck and pintail use…

Earlier this month brought a spell of ideal conditions for sea-watching; strong winds blowing onshore from the Irish Sea, offering the opportunity to get close views of migrating seabirds that would otherwise be passing by far out to sea. It just so happened that I had previously arranged to meet a new species protection warden volunteer at Point of Ayr on one of these days wild days, and what a day it was!

We were lucky enough…

After a warm, wet and occasionally sunny summer on the Dee Estuary, autumn seems to be just around the corner. This is an exciting time on the reserve with numbers of wildfowl and waders starting to swell, including scarce, short-staying migrants such as the single pectoral sandpiper which has been staying at Burton Mere Wetlands for the past week.

Another autumnal clue at this time of year is farmers busy cutting and harvesting…

There will be diggers working on site for the next couple of weeks, carrying out some essential habitat management works to improve the reserve for birds and other wildlife.

The main work is to excavate a shallow pool in front of the Marsh Covert hide. Though this area floods during the winter, we struggle to hold water on this area year round; It has never been excavated before, just floods naturally. You may remember…

Ever fancied the chance to get up-close and personal with badgers in their natural habitat?

Alasdair Grubb

We're offering an opportunity to get a truly fantastic experience to get really close and watch/study these fascinating animals, and give you an evening you will never forget. Whether you want to sit and observe these exquisite animals at close quarters, or get some phenomenal photo opportunities of them, this…

“Non-native” species are usually considered to be, at best, a bit of a pain. In many respects we are pretty lucky here on the Dee, that we only really have one unwelcome non-native plant species, Crassula helmsii (Or New Zealand Pygmyweed). Our colleague Ash, at Woolston Eyes, has much more to deal with; balsam, knotweed, Giant hogweed... (he may blog this about soon).

We may only have the one to contend…

Assistant Warden, John fills us in on a busy spring at our key site on the Welsh side of the Dee Estuary reserve:

Since May I have been leading on our ‘EU LIFE+’ funded project at Point of Ayr for the protection of little terns. The aim of the project is to provide a secure habitat for breeding birds that are dispersing from the large colony at Gronant (3 miles west of Point of Ayr). I am happy to say that…

Two years ago, the RSPB were chosen to help deliver a programme of habitat restoration and management at Woolston Eyes Nature Reserve. Read on to find out what Assistant Warden, Ash has been getting up to and about the wildlife that the site is so special for:

Woolston Eyes Nature Reserve is located to the east of Warrington between the river Mersey and the Manchester ship canal. The reserve consists of four large lagoons which…

If you’ve been to the reserve recently, you may have noticed a bit of building work ongoing. This is to convert one of the buildings into our new office, and create some residential volunteering accommodation in the house by the car park. Behind this house there is a fantastic garden.

It is a large garden with 2 large ponds (previously used as part of the former fishery). Once the building renovation has finished…

Summer is finally here - sometimes. It seems that the weather this season just cannot make up its mind. Wet and miserable days followed by days of intense heat with no rain. I cannot tell if I’m coming or going some days! Must be the heat messing with my mind. Or is it the rain? I have no clue!

With the hot (and cold!) weather comes the spring / summer birds. You may have noticed that the birds that were around…

Sitting here writing in the pouring rain, it's not just some of the birds that are beginning to give the impression of autumn. After the glorious heatwave which took us up to the solstice, we've had almost a week's worth of showers and again some stiff breezes that hardly feel like June.

Yet just as we were getting a taste of hot summer, some of the birds were beginning to behave like autumn is on the horizon…