Hello from a warm and bright Fen Drayton Lakes.
It’s been a while since anyone posted on the blog and now I have started as the new Visitor Experience Officer at Fen Drayton Lakes, I hope to update things more regularly.
I am new to the area, having moved from sunny Somerset and am thoroughly enjoying learning about this wonderful reserve.
Fen Drayton Lakes nature reserve comprises of various lakes and ponds and is home to an array of wonderful wildlife throughout the year. In the winter, huge numbers of ducks, swans and geese congregate on the lakes, including the very unusual looking egyptian goose, which I was admiring on Monday. With the arrival of spring and warmer weather, brings dancing dragonflies and damselflies onto the reserve and of course magnificent hobbies, demonstrating their high-speed aerial maneuvers and catching insects above the water.
Far Fen Lake. Fen Drayton RSPB reserve, Cambridgeshire. Image by Andy Hay (rspb images)
My highlight of the week has to be watching the mating display of great crested grebes on Ferry Lagoon. Love was certainly in the air for those two, with lots of elaborate head shaking and fanning out of their feathers. I hope to spot this lovely pair more over the next few months and fingers crossed there will be the arrival of baby great crested grebes to follow. Fen Drayton Lakes was fortunate to have twenty great crested grebe pairs on the reserve last year, so it is definitely worth visiting the reserve over the next few weeks to catch a glimpse of their beautiful mating display.
Great-crested grebe (Podiceps cristatus), performing weed dance as part of courtship display. Image by David Tipling (rspb images)
In addition and thanks to The Ouse Washes Landscape Partnership Trust and Heritage Lottery Fund, Fen Drayton Lakes has now launched six new tern rafts onto the lakes. The new rafts have been ‘doubled up’ to create three larger rafts that have now been launched into the lakes with the arrival of the first common tern sighting in the county. The rafts are a useful way of providing island habitat in areas of deep or fluctuating water levels, where islands or areas of land would not occur. Their purpose is to improve breeding success by providing areas safe from flooding, disturbance or predation and is often used as resting places by various bird species during the winter.
Last year ten small tern rafts were launched around the reserve, resulting in thirty three nesting common terns. Furthermore, one pair of Oystercatchers nested and thus the rafts may also have a potential for breeding Oystercatchers. With the addition of the new rafts this year, reserve staff are hoping for an increase in tern nesting and maybe even further interest from Oystercatchers.
Assistant wardens Andy Mercer and Hannah Bernie launching one of the new rafts onto Ferry Lagoon. Image by Bev Phillips
The newly launched tern raft on Ferry Lagoon. Image by Bev Phillips