Lots of sightings to report from the last few days, thanks to all our visitors for filling up the recent sightings book! Make sure you tell us what you’ve seen on your trip to Fairburn, we love hearing about it. I hope you’ve all enjoyed the sunshine, we definitely have and so has the wildlife!
On Sunday, the warm weather spurred our toads and frogs into mating action and we had lots of them around the visitor centre making a fair bit of noise. So look out for frog and toad spawn in the pond!
We’ve also had lots of butterfly sightings including peacocks, small tortoiseshell, brimstone, small copper and a green veined white. There have been a fair few bumblebees about too.
The swallows have finally arrived and so lots of sightings of them, along with plenty of sand martins and a few house martins. I still find it a bit tricky to tell the difference between these two types of martins, especially with their fast, agile flying. The easiest way to distinguish between them is by the sand martin’s brown band across its breast whereas the house martin is pure white underneath.
We’ve also seen the arrival of a few terns on the reserve. There have been a couple of common terns and also an arctic tern sighting on Main Bay. Elsewhere on the reserve we’ve had a couple of sightings of yellow wagtail, some blackcaps, willow warblers and chiffchaffs. On Monday we had our first cuckoo, which was both seen and heard down at Lin Dike where there’s also been a sighting of a whitethroat.
We’ve had avocets at Hicksons most days although they decided to hide away when we went to see them on Saturday for our Members Weekend! We’ve also had some whimbrel spotted this morning at the Flashes along with a female marsh harrier.
If you fancy seeing the stunning kingfisher, have a look at our kingfisher screen as they’ve been making regular appearances. There’s been a barn owl and a weasel spotted on the reserve too so there’s plenty to see here at Fairburn Ings, it's a busy time of year!