I’m starting today’s sightings blog on a little bit of a sad note, as it’s my last day here at Fairburn. So I’d just like to say a massive thank you to everyone who reads the blog, as well as to the entire Fairburn team for making my stay here so brilliant – I’ve loved every moment.

I was lucky enough this morning to see our new live nest box camera feed switched on in the visitor…

We had loads of great sightings last week over half term, along with some much-needed sunshine!  The feeders around the visitor centre are seeing plenty of action as ever, with relatively rarely-seen birds such as lesser redpolls, willow tits and siskins dropping by for a spot of lunch, along with our ever-present tits, finches and tree sparrows. 

Lesser redpolls are easiest to see in winter after the trees have lost their…

We've started monitoring for booming Bitterns this week ahead of the coming breeding season, and lo and behold, we've had some fantastic sightings!  These highly secretive and shy birds are notoriously difficult to spot, but visitors have been getting great views of one from the roadside on Phalarope pool - we've even got a great photo to share which was taken by one of our wonderful visitors just yesterday!…

Even though it’s only Wednesday, we’ve had plenty of great sightings already this week.  All of our fantastic wildfowl are in fine form ready for the breeding season, and several have been noticed in pairs just this morning, including shovelers, teals and shelducks.  This really is the best time of year to appreciate the rainbow of colours on display from those marvellous drakes, and just yesterday our volunteer…

Our warden team are busy throughout the year, but at this time of year they are particularly busy making sure the reserve is ready for spring, when most of the wildlife here will be using Fairburn Ings to raise their new families.  Lots of animals breed on the site, so there’ll be a lot of new families that will call Fairburn Ings home. 

The team have been planting hedgerow plants like hawthorn and blackthorn, which…

Lizzie normally does our recent sightings blog and what a good job she does, her attention to detail really brings the Fairburn blog to life, today Julie has written the sightings blog.

So I’ve been looking through our recent sightings book and can’t help but notice the number of raptors listed, Thursday 6 Feb a peregrine was seen over the visitor centre, a buzzard at Pick up hide, a sparrowhawk over the car…

It may seem that Spring is a long way off for the moment (we’re crossing our fingers against a repeat of last year’s March blizzards!), but there have been signs of new life springing up (sorry, couldn’t resist) all over the reserve the past couple of weeks.

Probably the most noticeable difference is the joyous sound of birdsong in the air! Walking through the woods along the riverbank trail lately…

Given that it’s such a beautiful sunny morning here at Fairburn Ings, I thought I may as well kick off today’s sightings blog with a bird I’ve just seen in the wildlife garden – the lovely nuthatch! Nuthatches are regular visitors to our wildlife garden feeders nowadays, but this hasn’t always been the case – the first sighting of a nuthatch here on the reserve was as recent as September 2012, and we know they bred in…

Here's a blog from our fantastic wildlife garden volunteers... enjoy

Firstly Happy New Year to you all, and welcome to our first blog of 2014.

Lets begin by saying what unusual weather we have been having, so much so it seems to be fooling some species into thinking its Spring already. You may notice birds singing and early budding on our plants. Early for this time of year!

Now is a great time to ensure nextboxes…