Er, not boat. I meant carpark. (This being Frampton Marsh and not Amity island)
My word, it was busy out there on Sunday. With a large groups of both birdwatchers and a local rambling group visiting us, the car park was pushed to bursting point. We even had people parking on the grass verges of the road. Which is obviously something we try to avoid as much as possible. Great to see so many people, out and about in the fresh air and enjoying the reserve.
In terms of wildlife, the highlight of the weekend was the appearance of the first ringed plovers of the year. Back to stake out their claims to prime breeding territory on the islands of the scrapes and reedbed. Nice to see them back! The question now is, which will come back next. Avocet or little ringed plover? Lay your bets...
Also around at the weekend were a couple of hen harriers, a merlin whizzing through the plover flocks and sending everything into a panic and some nice barn owls. Onm the wader front, golden plover numbers remain high, with lapwings and dunlin mixed in. Three black tailed godwits also dropped in and there were a good number of snipe to be seen. Out on the water our regulars (including the ever popular red crested pochard and Richardson's canada gose) were joined by small parties of both Bewick and whooper swans.
Looking ahead, this is half term week in Lincolnshire, so when isn the best time to come out? Well, Tuesday looks to be the best day in terms of weather...
We do have explorer packs and spotting sheets to take out onto the reserve to keep the little ones occupied. And binoculars to hire for the bigger ones. So come pay us a visit!
Reedbed, freshwater scrapes, saltmarsh and wet meadow. Frampton Marsh has it all! Come and pay us a visit soon.
And the answer......the first avocets were seen on March 3rd, so it's a rollover! Yesterday (March 7th) there were over 20.