Although summer never came to anything this year, autumn has definitely made it's presence felt.
I spent this morning clearing up about two weeks worth of leaf litter from the paths between the hides, with the help of Bruce - one of the local volunteers. The storms and winds we've been having this week made our job that little bit harder today as so much leaf litter was picked up in each stroke of the rake and huge piles now clutter the side of the path. We were given a little treat when we stopped for a break by the feeding station between Gullery and East Hide - not only did we see a red squirrel scurrying along by the bench, we also saw a great spotted woodpecker flit about around the top of the birch trees. The usual suspects were at the feeders; plenty of coal tits, blue tits, great tits and chaffinch. I was hoping I would see some of the long tailed tits that had been feeding of the fat squares yesterday, but I was not lucky enough to get them two days in a row.
A few of the trees along the path have not managed to withstand the winds we have been having this week.
This huge beech tree has fallen over the outflow channel just past the sluice bridge. Fortunately the tree has not caused any damage to the path and is not a hazard to any path walkers. From the size of the tree it could have been much worse!
More of our winter visitors seem to be making an appearnce around the reserve now - another sign of autumn. I saw my first goosander of the season today; there was three females in the far top corner of East lochan, although from the visitors book they arrived on Sunday (23rd). Something I also haven't seen for awhile that was around today was a cormorant. Duck numbers have risen in the last few weeks as well; especially wigeon (26), shoveler (9) and gadwall(5). And there seems to be less swallows, house and sand martins around now - only one house martin was recorded today. Have they finally left us now? Speaking of migration, no ospreys have been seen on-site for the last few weeks, and the last time a juvenile marsh harrier was recorded was on the 12th. A female marsh harrier has been seen since then - as recent as the weekend (23rd Sept)! However, from speaking to a few visitors that saw they female, they say it was a tagged female - so seeing as our harrier pair was not tagged, I have to assume this female was passing through.
The Koniks are their usual selves. They are happyily grazing at the West End and are alway content when I go to check on them. Sometimes I treat them with apples and carrots, but seeing as they are quite fat on what they've been grazing on while they've been here, they don't get treats very often. I mainly use treats while I'm trying to halter train them. As they are not domesticated - and we have no plans to domesticate them - trying to get halters on all 4 of them has been a challenge. We are only halter training to get them used to halters and being handled when the vet comes - we've had too much practice of trying, and failing to, get them penned up an hour before the vet has been due!