On our last volunteer day before Christmas David, Steve, Bill, Dave and I were back on the Powderham Reserve hedgelaying. This is a continuation of a programme of work that was started last winter to create a habitat to attract cirl buntings.  This little bird is a relative of the yellowhammer and is now very scarce in the UK and is restricted to South Devon and Cornwall only. Cirl buntings can be seen in the nearby village…

Gates, fences, paths, ditches all need constant maintenance on the Exe Estuary reserves. Cattle are needed to keep grass short to provide a suitable habitat for waders, geese and ducks (star species of Exminster and Powderham Marshes) but they are clumsy and heavy creatures. Having a good old scratch on a post or gate means that the weekly and residential volunteers are constantly busy fixing things.

A few weeks ago…

Our school and education work has continued and visits to the local ones have been undertaken as resources allowed. However we have made good progress this month and we have recruited 5 keen volunteers all with varying experience and knowledge to help us take this work forward. With so many people willing to help we hope to set up a team which will help with continuity of effort and also encourage individual development…

Finally our water levels within the sites have started to rise and the reserves are looking like the wet grasslands we expect them to be at this time of year. Pleasingly the birds have responded and the fields have become alive with our feathered friends. Black-tailed godwits chatter as they furiously feed in the cattle footprints and on the edges of pools whilst the wigeon nibble on the grass that is still not admitting…

The Exe Estuary Reserve Volunteer Work Party meet every Thursday during autumn and winter to tackle the hedge laying and brash clearing required on the reserves. We have been lucky with the weather and have experienced days of gorgeous sunshine and have enjoyed throwing off the fleeces and thermals to work in shirt sleeves. We did suffer one very wet day but the hardiest members of the team persevered despite getting…

This is my favourite time of year to see wildlife around the farm and out on the local nature reserves. Something well worth doing is having a walk around the farm here at Darts; massive flocks of finches are now on site. Goldfinch, Linnet, Chaffinch and best of all Greenfinch are all making the most of the old sunflower heads out in the field. Greenfinches have had a hard few years lately, what with Trichomonosis …

All the work recently hasn’t just been to benefit wildlife – we have also brought the diggers in to create a new nature trail at the end of the Turf Hotel path and have installed the basic foundations for a viewing screen which will over look parts of the marshes which flood during the winter months. A very simple construction based on one at Arne, we plan to get it completed by the end of next month just in time for people…

The ditch clearance work at Powderham is now complete and the ditches are starting to fill with water and pleasingly the levels pick out and follow the shallow gradients up the sides. This section of the reserve has been transformed in recent weeks; the effect of the clearance work has been dramatic, revealing an open landscape, which should be very desirable for our breeding lapwing. The removal of scrub, previously…

One of the less obvious summer treasures of the reserve is the reptile population – common lizards, grass snakes and slow worms lurk around here. By and large they are secretive and inconspicuous, usually only basking in the sun long enough to warm up before going about their business, and never too far from cover to retreat into. I always feel privileged to come across any one of them, even if the encounter is only for…

With the sunshine and showers of late it has felt more like April than August!! Although it has seemed as if rain is always on the horizon, the amount we have had over the reserves has made little impression on the very low water levels. The ground being high and dry has enabled all our management work to go on apace however sightings of the first avocets on the 19th of the month focused our minds a little as we know…

The production of briquettes from our baled material has made excellent progress recently as the material that has been harvested and gone for the trials has proved to be just 17% moisture. For briquetting the requirement is that it is at most 20% otherwise there is a danger it can explode whilst being compressed – which as you can imagine is not desirable. Whilst some of the arisings resulting from reserve management…

The rush control programme has gone well, with the last areas to be cut now completed, the baling and removal has been following on behind and the cows and calves are enjoying the new grass growth as the showers encourage the fresh green shoots. This has been most helpful in deterring them from breaking out across the now dry ditches in search of greener grass. These are however perfect conditions for the ditching work…

Avocets have been seen back on the Exe, only 2 so far, but these birds will continue to return back to their wintering ground here on the river. Probably the best place to look for them is on Bowling Green Marsh over very high tides. Later in the year when the numbers have grown, the birds will be visible from a number of sites across the Exe. Other news from this weekend on Sat (20^th) a Bittern was seen flying into Bowling…

The late summer months on the reserve are the quietest times for birds and our busiest time for getting work done. The breeding birds have finished and the winter birds are just starting to arrive so we have been planning the work programme carefully. Once the vegetation management is complete thanks to funding from Pennon Environmental Trust we will be re-surfacing some of the paths, installing new signs and building…

It is hard to believe that August is here, the summer is racing by, however there is the constant reminder from the natural world, as duck broods can be seen bobbing on the open water areas, dragonflies actively hawk the ditches and some of the migrant birds start to return from their breeding grounds to prepare for the winter in the UK. The numbers of waders can be seen starting to build at Bowling Green Marsh and it…

August heralds the time to migrate for many of our summer breeding birds. At a number of sites across Devon a steady flow of passage birds have been ringed and counted, Willow warblers, Chiffchaffs, Reed warblers and Blackcaps among others, all starting their long haul flight back to the wintering grounds in southern Europe and Africa.

Here at Darts The Gull numbers continue to impress, with daily sightings of Mediterranean…

June is a great month to see birds and wildlife in your own back garden. With the warm, dry spring lot’s of familiar birds are busy feeding or caring for their young. If you’re lucky and have birds in a nest box make sure there is a fresh water source and also feeding stations to help the parent birds until the young are ready to fledge. If you don’t have any breeding birds in the garden, don’t worry as once birds have…

RSPB Exminster and Powderham Marshes are managed for the benefit of breeding waders in the summer and large numbers of waders and wildfowl in the winter. Although during the winter months the reserves come alive with birds, the numbers of breeding waders are a cause for concern as they continue to dwindle. Redshanks have failed to breed for the last two years and lapwings have decreased form 26 pairs in 2006 to 12 pairs…

Work on our use of the vegetative material produced from reserve management work is making good progress. We are currently planning our summer work as we will look to cut and remove the rush from the fields late summer. Last year we managed to turn this into briquettes for burning and this year our trials will look to progress the different harvesting and drying techniques needed to see if we can improve the process.…

Our cameras on the lapwing nests have been very successful and the story continues to unfold revealing the fate of our lapwing nests. From 12 pairs, 6 nests have hatched 3 have been seen to be nobbled by mammalian predators and the remaining 3 have been also taken – but managed to escape being caught on camera.

Some pairs are still trying to relay on the grassland of Exminster which is great news and we wait…

Well it is a bumper year for some of our wildlife as the butterflies and dragonflies particularly enjoy the fine bright weather, using the sheltered spots to escape the breeze and make the most of their short time to display their colours. There is a currently an excellent selection out on Exminster Marshes, which makes up for the limited variety of birds at this time of year. But dawn is still a super time to hear the…