A new species for the British list!? Sadly no, just a little egret sporting some brightly coloured rings in the field to the west of the reserve today. If you are fortunate enough to see it, please have a good look to see if the rings have letters or numbers on them, and then submit your record to the BTO via their website http://www.bto.org/ using the 'report a ringed bird' button on their home page.

If you are…

At the risk of becoming repetitive, I can report that a bittern is still here. We started a work party this morning, but gave up when the snow made the chainsaw difficult to see. Two of the volunteers took refuge in Reedbed Hide, and were rewarded with a fly-past. After a flurry of records in early January, the bird has been seen only about once a week lately, but the weather hasn't been great and observers have been scarce…

Three photographers have just posted their recent pics of a bittern on the Cambridgeshire Bird Club website. Fantastic! Here's the link http://cambsbirdclub.blogspot.co.uk/.

Matt Mellor has uploaded some photos of a bittern swimming on the Fowlmere Flickr website (best to google it). They were taken at c11.50 from Reedbed Hide, looking left at the pool that we have recently weeded.

Another visitor saw a bittern in flight this afternoon, and two merlins flew past the hide at 4pm.

On Friday I was shown some photos of a bittern out in the open on the area we've cut recently by the mere. This is the fourth sighting of a bittern this month (2nd, 4th, 6th, 9th), and the second where it was standing in that area by the mere. I hope some of the photos will be posted on this website and also on the Cambridgeshire Bird Club website soon (link to the latter for future reference: http://cambsbirdclub.blogspot…

The chiffchaff that has been here for a couple of months was in the scrub at the end of the car park again this morning.

Blogging more frequently is not one of my New Year resolutions, but it is about time I posted something. My recent silence has not been due to laziness or even absentmindedness, but just being too busy.

Now that the roosting starlings and clouds of fieldfares and redwings have moved on, the reserve can seem rather quiet at this time of year, but there are birds to be found when the wind drops. I and a regular birder recorded…

The advantage of having five barn owl chicks of widely differing ages is that some or all can be seen over a period of several weeks. With the fledging of four of the chicks, only the fifth is restricted to the box, but its older siblings are still visible in the evenings as they clamber around the tree. Therefore, if you haven't seen them already I reckon you have about a week to do so before they start to disperse. Evening…

This morning I spent half an hour showing visitors our barn owls. The oldest chick came out of the box on to the shelf and stretched its wings, before returning back inside. It still has some wisps of down on its head, back and wing coverts, but it can't be far from leaving the box for the first time. I saw 5 chicks in the box last week, so we can expect lots of activity during the next fortnight.

 Both adults were…

Regular readers will remember that last year we built a bank near Spring Hide in which kingfishers could nest. The bank now has it's first residents, but unfortunately they are not kingfishers - a family of wrens is being reared in a 'normal' nest on the edge of the bank, in a location that is typical of the species. I have put a poster in Spring Hide so visitors can spot it.

Denise Anderson has produced a lovely short film about her visits to Fowlmere in May, published on our Forum. Just like the real Springwatch somewhere else, there are some great close-ups of birds, flowers and insects with lots of bird song in the background. Last week Chris Packham observed that barn owls are absent from Springwatch this year, but they are the stars of the show at Fowlmere! Denise has captured an extended…

Occasionally people ask why I don't blog more often. One reason is that I spend time writing something (as I have been for the last hour), and then it all disappears when I click on the 'publish' button. Frustrating or what!? I must speak to the IS people (and save my work more frequently).

No matter, here's my second attempt to tell you about a pleasant evening on the reserve yesterday. Most people seem to…

Apologies to anyone who thinks I should be posting more often. I did write something about our first chiffchaffs last week, but it disappeared off somewhere never to be seen again.

Anyway, the first chiffchaff was heard on 8th March, which is a few days earlier than usual, and by the end of last week there were at least eight singing at the reserve. We then had to wait nearly a fortnight before the next summer visitors…

In an attempt to show that the reserve is not totally devoid of birds, I've compiled a list of species seen by several observers who went round this morning before the rain arrived at 10.30. Most of these were seen by Ade Cooper in about two hours.

Grey heron     Teal     Mallard     Common buzzard     Water rail     Moorhen     Black-headed gull     Common gull     Lesser black-backed gull     Stock dove     Woodpigeon     Collared dove     Barn owl     Kingfishe…

On first impressions the reserve seems quiet at the moment, especially as the greylags seem to have departed, but there is still plenty to be seen if you are patient.

I spent a couple of hours on the reserve today, doing a few jobs and eating my lunch in Reedbed Hide. A dozen teal were looking splendid on the mere, one (or more) kingfisher(s) visited briefly (I saw two together yesterday), a juvenile sparrowhawk glided…

I went to check the barn owl chicks this afternoon, and all three were out of the nest. When they weren't flying around, they were perched in a row on a branch, preening each other. Excellent!

I guess they will be around, in and out of the nestbox, for another week or so (or maybe longer - I'd need to look up how long they tend to stay).

Hopefully someone will post a photo.

We checked the nest box on 10th October (under licence, of course), and it contained 3 chicks! The oldest was 50 days, so it should be fledging in the third or fourth week of October. The youngest should fledge in the first week of November. Regular watchers will know that the young owls clamber out of the nest shortly before fledging, and can be seen sitting on the box or on adjacent branches in the evenings.

 

We sometimes receive comments from visitors who don't seem to have seen much at the reserve, and more than once the expression 'there are more birds in my garden' has been used. Therefore I thought I'd post the list that a local birder sent me after his visit on Saturday 12th October:- 5 Little Grebe, 6 Fieldfare, 35 Redwing, 10+ Song thrush, 4+ Blackbird, 4+ Common Snipe, 4 Bullfinch, Chaffinch, Goldfinch, Linnet, Siskin…

While I was away last week, one of the volunteers let me know that there were chicks in the barn owl nestbox. Today I saw two, quite big but still fluffy. Excellent!

Yesterday's version hasn't formatted properly, so I'm trying again with the paragraphs in the right places, but I can see that it hasn't worked. Apologies to anyone who prefers to read a properly- structured article. End of paragraph. One of the highlights of the breeding season was the fledging of two lapwing chicks from the single pair that nested by the mere. On the downside, the bearded tits didn’t stay to breed…

A pair of lapwings have nested again by the mere. The period of waiting for their eggs to hatch is always an anxious time; watching the water levels to check that the nest isn't flooded or left high and dry, cheering the adults on as they chase off another crow, hoping no fox or mink turns up. Thankfully three of the four eggs hatched on Sunday 9th June, and as I write there are still three lovely little chicks darting…

I found myself asking this question yesterday as I put on my woolly hat and scarf before meeting the volunteers for the weekly work party. The main task was putting the finishing touches to the new kingfisher nesting bank at Spring Hide, the culmination of several month's work by Richard H and various vols. It looks brilliant, but will the kingfishers think so? It may be too late this year, although there is an outside…

It may not have felt like it this week, with northerly winds and flurries of snow, but winter is gradually drawing to an end and we are completing various tasks before the birds start nest building. It is obvious to me where our team of regular volunteers have been toiling away throughout the winter, but the results are most visible to the public when we get contractors in. Last week our reed cutting contractor cut >2ha…

On Tuesday we started cutting reeds to the east of the mere, and it was going really well until the mower head seized up at the end of the morning. We will finish cutting that section tomorrow as part of our weekly work party (always on Thursdays).

One bonus was flushing two jack snipe from the rushy parts of the reedbed. They are probably the same birds that we saw at the beginning of the month, but if you're tempted…

We will be cutting the reeds to the east and west of the mere on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday this coming week. We cut reeds somewhere every winter, but this time the area is larger than in previous years. As well as clearing the fen where lapwings bred successfully last year, we will clear out the accumulated old reeds from an area that hasn't been managed for some time.

We will start at 9am and finish about…