Good afternoon. Firstly, I would like to thank Emma for her great blog post from last Saturday. I am now back in the office after two weeks off so here are some more recent sightings:
I will begin with some images that we were sent just before I went away of a bittern feeding in front of Mere Hide:
Image credits: John Organ
I will now start off where Emma left off with some sightings from this week: Last Sunday, at least 11 ruffs and a juvenile curlew sandpiper were seen on the washland.
Suzanne saw a common buzzard over Brandon Fen on Wednesday. There was plenty to see on Thursday and Suzanne saw four bearded tits around Brandon Fen. There was also plenty to see on the washland and here are the maximum counts from the day:
Warden Alan saw a great white egret from New Fen viewpoint yesterday morning. I popped in yesterday afternoon and saw two kingfishers perched at the edge of the visitor centre pond. Two hobbys were hunting overhead and we saw four little stints on the washland.
There have been plenty of good waders on the washland so far today and here are the maximum counts so far:
At least 10 bearded tits have been feeding near the Washland viewpoint and another group have been feeding in front of Mere Hide. Volunteer Roy saw a Cetti's warbler around Brandon Fen and I saw a hobby over the visitor centre at lunchtime.
I led a short guided walk earlier on and we saw plenty of ruddy darter dragonflies alongside East Wood. We also saw several marbled orb weaver spiders on our travels.
If you are planning to visit the reserve, please note that there are still cattle grazing on the riverbank Public Footpath between the Washland viewpoint and Joist Fen viewpoint.
We hope to see you soon!