Havergate Island

As we continue to protect and preserve the unique beauty of Havergate Island, we've been hard at work behind the scenes, even while the island has been closed to visitors over the breeding season. Our dedicated volunteer team has been busy maintaining the infrastructure, tackling tasks like painting and mending hides. Although our to-do list remains extensive, we're making steady progress.

One of our significant…

Before I start this roundup, I just want to say that the island is looking stunning at the moment. With the sunny but wet summer that we had last year, the gorse is absolutely thriving! I haven’t seen it looking a bright and full for many years now. Along with the gorse, we have the thrift and sea campion which has added a beautiful touch of colour to the shingle.

Since my last update, life on Havergate Island…

Hey there! Apologies, it has been a while since the last island update – let's dive right into an update of last year's bird breeding triumphs and then a quick update of what we have been up to this past year on our wild Havergate Island.

Last year's bird success: Our feathered friends kept us on our toes with a steady gull colony count, boasting 1524 lesser black back pairs and 642 herring gull pairs…

This is the perfect time of year to explore our wild isle (the only island in Suffolk), and our special Havergate Adventure, taking place in a couple of weeks, will help you get the most out of your visit, whatever your age or interests.  Whether you want to learn more about the island’s wildlife, or just enjoy the charm and serenity of this special place, the knowledgeable RSPB Woodbridge Local Group members will treat…

Want to visit?

Before we get into the gossip of the island, I would like to highlight that our trips are due start up again towards the end of July. We are running a great selection of guided, unguided and photography trips over a range of dates all of which can be found on our website; https://events.rspb.org.uk/havergateisland.

One of our most popular trips is the Havergate Adventure which is running from Saturday …

In recent years Havergate Island has become  home to the 2^nd largest breeding Spoonbill colony in the UK. This year will be their 4^th year nesting on the island and so we wanted to undertake some habitat works to make sure the island was in the best condition for them.

Last year we were lucky enough to secure a generous grant from the Suffolk Coasts and Heaths AONB which would allow us to carry out this work. This included…

It has been very quiet on Havergate Island with no visitors coming along to visit. However, the good news is we have been working towards getting our visitor trips and events up and running again! Our full events programme and booking information can be found here http://events.rspb.org.uk/havergateisland

All our usual trips will be going ahead including our event weekends over the Spring and Autumn and our Havergate Adventure…

First things first, I am sorry to say we have decided not to run the Havergate Adventure this year. With the decision made not relax the restrictions on the 21st June we thought it was the best and safest idea to postpone and work at getting all our trips up and running again for next year. All is not lost though, this allows us to do some much-needed maintenance on our jetty, boat, and visitor infrastructure on the island…

Apologies for such a delayed update on our Havergate Reserves. I was hoping to be able to give some good news and say that our trips will be up and running again soon but, unfortunately, we have made the decision to postpone all our visitor trips this year. However, we hope to welcome all visitors back in the new year with a great events program, as well as our regular first Saturday of the month trips.

When I say postpone…

For those of you that have visited Boyton recently or are planning to visit soon, you will have seen that there has been a lot of activity happening in the fields that you can see along the river wall heading south towards Hollesley. These fields totaling 33ha were purchased back in 2015 and run alongside our existing Boyton Reserve.

Just to give you a quick vision of our overall project plan - the idea with these fields…

Having recently returned to work after spending 9 months on maternity leave, I have returned to a workplace that is a very different workplace to the one I left. Although no visitor trips have taken place allowing people out to enjoy Havergate as they usually would, the island has still been moving beautifully on through the seasons oblivious to everything else that has been happening.

Unfortunately, not all the usual…

This year we are back to running our popular hare events on Havergate Island. The hare numbers on the island are always up and down depending on certain factors such as predation, disease and generally whether we have had a harsh winter and/or had a successful breeding year. We have been seeing good numbers all around the island recently and so would like to share them with you.

Hares have been present on the island…

It is not surprising that our winter trips out to Havergate are always very popular. This is the time of year we see big numbers of wildfowl and waders feeding on the mud around the island and on our lagoons.

We seem to have hit jackpot with our water levels this month. The lagoon levels are fairly low on all of the lagoons, and all the available muddy edges are making them hard to resist for all the waders. We control…

All of our 2020 Events are now on our website ready to be booked onto.

We will still be offering the normal first Saturday of the month ‘Explore Havergate Island’  trip (except May, June and July when the island is closed). This trip is a Non Guided trip where you are free to explore the hides and trails at your own pace. A guide will be present on the island should you prefer to stay with someone and learn…

Every month a group of young Wildlife Explorers meet at RSPB Minsmere for a morning of fun and wildlife watching. Their programme is varied, ranging this year from learning about Aldeburgh's swifts to felting. Last Saturday they had the chance to something completely different: a visit to Havergate Island. As both a parent and assistant leader, I was lucky enough to join them for my first visit to the island for a…

We have been very busy on Havergate Island recently running plenty of visitor trips of all different styles to cater to everyone!

We had a very successful weekend with the Havergate Adventure despite boat troubles and wild weather. Everyone enjoyed themselves on this more family orientated event.

We then run a fantastic ‘capturing first light on Havergate’ trip and were extremely lucky with the weather and conditions…

This is the perfect time of year to explore our wild isle (the only island in Suffolk), and our special Havergate Adventure, taking place next week, will help you get the most out of your visit, whatever your age or interests.  Whether you want to learn more about the island’s wildlife, or just enjoy the charm and serenity of this special place, the knowledgeable RSPB Woodbridge Local Group members will treat you to a two…

Can you believe that this July will be 70 years since the RSPB signed the deeds to Havergate Island. To celebrate this, we are running a special ‘history’ of Havergate guided walk. Myself and our Havergate volunteers have spent the last year hunting and researching for any information on the island and I think we have done quite well, the story has been pulled together beautifully.

The day involves 2 trips…

The last couple of months have been super busy ones on Havergate Island. It is all go on the Breeding bird surveys with full island gull counts going on, as well as keeping an eye on the smaller breeding birds. The gull numbers are steady – probably even slightly up on previous years. We counted 1665 Lesser Black backs sitting and 521 Herring Gulls.  Early on in the season gull numbers were fairly low, and it didn…

Havergate’s volunteer guide Steve was captain of our first wildlife river trip of the season.  The trip run on a chilly 26 April and the visitors enjoyed a boat trip around Havergate Island before landing for a little time to take a look out onto the lagoons.

It certainly looks like the highlight of the trip was the sighting of 2 curious seals! If you want to take a look at Steve’s blog and see some cracking photos…

How quickly the year goes.....before we know it, residential volunteer Mike is back out on the island and getting straight back into the swing of island life.  As usual I have a list of jobs ready for him to have a look at work through at his own pace. Being an island and prone to the worst of the weather here on the east coast,  the place can start to look shabby very quickly, especially after the winter. This year we had…

If you are looking for a trip that gives you the chance to take in the river Ore, learn a bit about the river and its surroundings but also give you a taster of Havergate Island then join us on one of our Wildlife River Trips on the Alde-Ore. On this trip you will enjoy a relaxing cruise around Havergate  with the added treat of landing on the island for a 40 minute stop to look out onto our main lagoon. 

Whilst heading…

We still have spaces available on our ‘through the seasons’ trips running on the 10 and 23 March. March is one of the best times to visit Havergate Island – it is when the large numbers of birds gather before they move onto their breeding locations and our brown hares are at their most active. These trips are the perfect opportunity to be taken to the favourite ‘hare haunts’ to spend some time with the hares…

After the drama of the tidal surge last month I can report that the island has drained and is back to its former spectacular self. I headed out there on Saturday for a very chilly day with the first visitor trip of the year. The visitors who braved the freezing cold were rewarded with lagoons packed full of birds, marsh harriers (before we even got of the boat), barn owls and hares.

As soon as we landed on the Jetty we…

Last week I decided to head straight out to Havergate on my first day back after Christmas break.  It certainly blew the cobwebs away and helped me get into a good state of mind for the new year. It was a wonderful day, cold but sunny, and the lagoons were heaving with birds. I didn’t do a full count but there were high numbers of duck and waders including, Dunlin, Redshank, Godwit and Grey plovers, wigeon and teal. I…