There’s been an explosion of baby frogs and toads in the last two days as they’ve started to emerge from the pond and embark on the next stage of their life cycle. At this stage they are often referred to as froglets and toadlets, and have now changed from their tadpole form into tiny versions of adult frogs and toads. Once you notice one of them, you’ll suddenly see loads crawling about and making the dangerous journey across the path!
The black-tailed godwits are still being seen on the Flashes towards Lin Dike, along with redshanks, lapwings, a curlew and a marsh harrier.
At Main Bay, there has been a yellow legged gull, avocets, common terns and pochards with young. Over at Big Hole, little ringed plovers and a common sandpiper were seen and at Pick-up there have been oystercatchers and a green sandpiper.
The kingfisher was seen regularly throughout yesterday at the Kingfisher Screen, and one visitor was chuffed to get his first ever sighting plus some fantastic photos too!
Our feeders around the visitor centre are full of tree sparrows with lots of juveniles about, and you can often see them being fed my mum and dad. There are also greenfinches, goldfinches, great tits, blue tits and bullfinches visiting the feeders, plus the more unusual nuthatch or great spotted woodpecker.
The wildflower patch outside our visitor centre is getting fuller and fuller, and keeps changing. At the moment it’s full of bedstraw, oxeye dasies, red clover and viper’s bugloss, and also lots of bees having a good feed! Elsewhere on the reserve we’ve got loads of foxgloves, and there are bee orchids on the Lin Dike trail near the iron bridge.
Here's a photo of one of the tiny toadlets we found on the path round the Discovery Trail :)