This week has witnessed a Kingfisher being seen by visitors every day down at the Kingfisher Screen, an opportunity I couldn’t miss – and I was lucky enough to watch one for a good twenty minutes on a cold, grey day this week. A fairly dull day was suddenly brightened by its appearance, and it’s been seen frequently by our visitors today.
We’ve had our first Waxwing today, at the Feeder Screen! Another glorious burst of colour. I’m really excited about the approach of winter after today, with the thought of all the different wildlife to be seen. Waxwings don’t breed in the UK, but they are winter visitors, in some years arriving in larger groups when the populations on breeding grounds become too big for the amount of food available, but we’ve yet to see what kind of a year this will be.
On Tuesday two Marsh Harriers flew over the Visitor Centre, and on Monday a Merlin was seen from Pickup Hide.
At the moment there seem to be quite a few Lesser Redpolls around the Discovery Trail and also around the Kingfisher Screen, as well as Long-tailed Tits pretty much everywhere! I can’t imagine ever seeing them without blathering on about how cute I find them!
A Little Grebe was seen this morning, at the Kingfisher Screen, and yesterday we had sightings of a Brown Hare and a Roe Deer up at the North Flashes. At Pickup, a Snipe was seen yesterday, and Curlews were seen at Lin Dike both today and yesterday. Also seen at Lin Dike yesterday were Greylag Geese, a Little Egret, and a Peregrine.
Plenty to get excited about in the coming weeks – if you’ve read my first post from November, you’ll be aware of how excited I am about winter this year! If you see me about the visitor centre on your next visit, I’d advise an escape plan before bringing up the approaching cold weather. I really think it’s fantastic how much wildlife we get in the winter – and it’s also a reminder that we aren’t in fact, as unlucky with the weather as we might sometimes feel!
Georgina Collins