Not the best week, weather wise on the reserve it has to be said. Fewer visitors, not surprisingly and a little less activity as wildlife hunkers down out of the rain. During rainy spells though insects are flying lower and this brings swifts and hirundines (swallows and martins) much lower too. Yesterday, at around 10am the skies over Waltons and around the first platform (VP1), was full of birds - swooping, soaring…

It's the first blog of May - surely one of the best months of the wildlife calendar for Ham Wall and many other places. Birds are still pouring into the country and many ending up at the reserve - even if many are just passing through. Ham Wall acts as a big feeding station for many birds arriving in Britain after a long journey.

Large numbers of martins and swallows have been seen on many days this week with well…

Well, Spring has most definitely sprung and it keeps on springing. Lots of active wildlife on the reserve this week once again including new arrivals and busy parents. 

Reserve staff and volunteers have been busy too and starting to get things right back up together after the strange and difficult year we've had. Being so busy, it's not left me much time for a blog this week so it might be a bit shorter than normal - just…

It's been a wonderfully sunny week on the reserve and good to see so many people out enjoying the weather and the wildlife. it's always a very interesting time of year with many new arrivals, a couple of hangers on from the winter and a whole host of birds already well into their breeding season.

In terms of new arrivals , confirmation that cuckoos are here, with several sightings over the last couple of days…

Yes, your eyes do not deceive you. It is a sightings blog from Ham Wall. I'm delighted to be back writing to you after more than a year since the last sightings blog from the reserve. Being a single parent I spent 9 of the last 13 months furloughed away from our wonderful reserve unable to work apart from a 3 month respite between September and Christmas but the sheer volume of work to catch up with meant the blog took…

 Welcome back! We’re delighted to have some of our facilities OPEN for your visit!  

  Car park (5 am- 10 pm)

  Outdoor, staffed Welcome Point (10 am- 4 pm, weekends guaranteed)

  Nature reserve trails (dawn - dusk)

  Toilets (5 am – 10 pm)

  Take away refreshments (10 am- 4 pm). Weekends and during the week when we have a volunteer. Card payments only.

  Picnic Area (dawn - dusk)

The following facilities continue to be…

With #Easter #BankHoliday approaching, a reminder that the following facilities at Ham Wall are OPEN for local exercise and recreation 

  Car park (5 am- 8 pm*)

  Outdoor, staffed Welcome Point (10 am- 4 pm, weekends guaranteed)  

  Nature reserve trails (Dawn - Dusk)

  Toilets (5 am- 8 pm*)

  Take away refreshments (10 am- 4 pm). Weekends and during the week when we have a volunteer. Card payments only.   

* 10 pm from 1 April

 The following…

 In line with Government guidance for #lockdown, the following facilities are OPEN at RSPB Ham Wall for local, essential, daily exercise only 

  Car park (5 am-6:30 pm)

  Trails (dawn-dusk)

  Toilets (5 am- 6:30pm)

The following facilities are CLOSED:

  Welcome Point

  Hides

  Refreshments

  Picnic Area

 Events

The car parks and trails remain open at Greylake and Swell Wood for local, essential, daily exercise only. The hides are…

  Ham Wall Christmas opening hours 

The reserve, hides and car park will be open as usual throughout the festive period.

The toilets, refreshments and welcome point will be closed on the following days

• 24 December – Christmas Eve
• 25 December – Christmas Day
• 26 December – Boxing Day

The toilets will be closed from 2 pm on 23 December and reopen at 9 am on 27 December.

We hope you are able to enjoy the…

Re-opening announcement 

We’re excited to be able to re-open some of our facilities for you on 2 December!

We are in Tier 2, so here's a quick summary of what’s available at RSPB Ham Wall:

 Car park open (5 am-6:30 pm). Car park machine card payment only, members park free.

 Outdoor, Covid-secure, staffed Welcome Point (Fri-Mon, 10 am- 4 pm)

 Reserve trails open (Dawn until Dusk)

 Toilets open (5 am-6:30 pm…

We know that for many of you, Ham Wall reserve provides enjoyment and solace in the natural world throughout these challenging times. In line with Government guidance on essential, daily exercise outdoors, during #SecondLockdown, our car park, trails and toilets remain open for you to visit. Please follow all current Government guidance around social distancing, who you can visit with, hygiene and follow all signage on…

*Please note that the starlings have now moved on from RSPB Ham Wall and so the murmuration season is over for another year. We'd like to thank everyone for their understanding during these difficult times and to all those who played their part this season in keeping RSPB Ham Wall safe for our visitors, staff, volunteers and the wildlife that calls the reserve home.

RSPB Ham Wall remains open for essential, local…

Tor View Hide reopen

We are delighted to announce that the rebuilding of the Waltons Screens and the essential maintenance to the Tor View Hide has been completed and they are all now open. You’ll notice we’ve made a few changes to keep everyone safe.  So that you can all safely enjoy watching the wonderful wildlife here, please be aware of the limited capacity and wear a face covering if able to. We've put…

We are delighted to share that the Avalon Hide is now open. You’ll notice we’ve made a few changes to keep everyone safe.  So that you can all safely enjoy watching the wonderful wildlife here, please be aware of the limited capacity and wear a face covering if able to. We've put hand sanitiser at the entrance to the hide, so please use it before going in. 

You'll see that we have spaced out the seating…

We’re delighted to announce we have now opened the Welcome Building at RSPB Ham Wall along with the car park and toilets! You’ll notice we’ve made some changes to help keep you and our staff and volunteers safe.

The Welcome Building will have reduced opening. We will be open from 10 am until 4 pm on weekends and during the week when we have a volunteer available.  We will be delivering our usual warm…

It’s Monday again which can only mean one thing – moths!  And it's Easter Monday no less - Happy Easter everyone!

It’s been an interesting week in our north Dorset garden.  The trap has been out on six occasions and with only one moth on Tuesday night and one moth on Wednesday night I was quite excited to get three on Friday morning.  And then it went crazy!  But I’m jumping ahead….. here’s how it all…

Well, we've made it through another week of lockdown. I hope everybody is keeping safe and well and that you have been able to enjoy wildlife in some form whether that is through social media, TV or up close and personal in your gardens or whilst taking your permitted daily exercise close to home. 

We may feel a bit restricted at the moment, but it's focusing a lot of us on what wildlife is on our own doorsteps and…

Well here's part 2 on ways to give nature a home in your garden. Remember, this comes from a complete novice at gardening  - but the information is out there. The internet is full of wonderful ideas - so now that you may have a little more time on your hands - what better time to give some of those ideas a go. 

In the first blog we looked at feeders for birds, placement, cleaning tips etc  and remember that filling your…

Welcome back to Moth Monday!  I’m happy to report that it warmed up a bit over the past week so I do have some new moths to show you from my garden in north Dorset.  But before we get onto those, here are the answers to last week's moth ID quiz:

Some fabulous (and quite long) names there.  Moths can have really interesting and sometimes quite odd names, hopefully we’ll encounter some of the stranger ones over…

Well, we've ticked off another week - my first full week away from the reserve since locking it down last Tuesday. I  have to say I am really missing the place as I'm sure many of you are too. I'm having to make do with wildlife sightings from my garden or from any encounters during the permitted exercise we are able to take each day. In fact I'm staring out of my windows now and can see house sparrows on my feeders…

Well, I've been asked to write a garden blog for the foreseeable future - given that the reserve is locked down for the moment. I thought I split it up a bit - get some sightings going like the normal Friday blog and perhaps dream about what might be going on at the reserve at the moment by sharing some stock photos. But also have a think about what we can all do to give nature a home in our own back yards - which is…

Greetings from north Dorset and welcome to our first Moth Monday! This is a new weekly blog about the moths and hopefully butterflies that I can find here at home, and I’ll be looking for your input too so please do get involved.

Although I’ve been working to improve it, my newish back garden isn’t a haven for wildlife (yet). Let's just say it's lacking in plant life and there isn't even much grass at the moment…

Hi everybody - I hope this, slightly different blog today finds you all safe and well. Things have changed very quickly in the last week or so and as I hinted in my blog on Monday much of the information I gave is already obsolete - in fact it lasted just a few hours with the new Government announcements on Monday night.

I have copied and pasted Abbie's message (our last blog post) which followed this announcement as…