We had our annual staff and volunteer barbecue yesterday evening and what a lovely evening it was to! The sun was shining and it was lovely and warm. Although it happens every year, despite the fact that there was a wonderful variety of food and drink on offer, certain individuals were still kept getting distracted. Most of you can probably guess what they were distracted by, but just in case you haven't, it was our wonderful wildlife of course!
As is often the case, the main cause of the distraction was our local barn owls! At one point, at least seven of the team abandoned their food and drink to watch these beautiful birds in action. Talk about getting your priorities right! There were two birds hunting over Brandon Fen and The Washland for most of the evening. Fortunately, Les had his camera with him and managed to take these lovely pictures. Enjoy!:
Image credits: Les Bunyan
Thanks so much for Les for sending these over. Those of us who stayed put near the visitor centre were rewarded with the sighting of a flyover green sandpiper, which called loudly and frequently as it went. This made it obvious what it was, despite the fact that it was rather high and it just looked like a dot to most people!
The visitor centre was definitely the place to be earlier in the day though and there was just so much to see! As I mentioned yesterday, a bittern was skulking about at the edge of the visitor centre pond in the morning and two kingfishers were fishing in the pond for most of the day. Grass snakes were seen swimming across the visitor centre pond on several occasions over the course of the day and the place was alive with dragonflies. These were mainly emperors and brown hawkers but there were also plenty of smaller damselflies to admire.
Further down the reserve, Nigel, one of our volunteers (and chief barbecuer!) saw three bittern flights from New Fen viewpoint in the space of and hour and also two kingfishers chasing each other around the pool in front of the viewpoint, There is plenty to see at the moment so why not come and visit? We hope to see you soon!
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