We lost access to the blog for a little while, but we're back in action again...
Headline news is that we're still flooded following Storm Babet and the reserve is still closed to the public. At the peak of the flooding, water levels were about 4 metres higher than normal winter levels and the reserve essentially became a colder version of the Mediterranean, with lots of water, a glossy ibis and up to 4 cattle egrets and 10 great white egrets thrown in for good measure. The public car park is now open and the public footpath that follows the perimeter of the site is now passable, but the actual reserve remains closed with no certainty over when we'll re-open. We still need to shift about a metre of water off site and we can only do this when the Trent drops and water can flow out through the Outfall Sluice. After the water leaves site we'll also need some time to allow the Visitor Trail to dry, debris to be removed and any damage to infrastructure repaired.
Photo below shows the impact of flooding on Phase 1 (the area in front of the Beach Hut) - the truck was moved prior to the water rising!
Two of the cattle egrets (Stuart Carlton)