There's been a good couple of inches of show on the reserve this weekend and it's made it much easier than usual to see exactly what's going on around the centre at night when nobody's around to see. Obviously there's lots of bird prints, from small brids under the feeders to huge heron prints along the ditch. We've had several different mammals about the place. There's lots of rabbit tracks and smaller stoat or weasel tracks around the car park. Down by the pond dipping area is obviously a favourite place for deer- this is a roe deer print just on the edge of the pond-
The entrance track is also a pretty busy route at nights too. The two sets of prints below (we originally thought these were the same animal- which led to a bit of confusion over the ID- thank's to The Mammal Society for helping us out!) are badger (the two prints at the top) and also otter (the single print- photoshopped a bit to make it stand out).
It's a good time for otter spotting on the reserve right now, it was seen from Fen Hide by our volunteers during the week and a regular visitor Peter Lewis took these great pictures of it from Bay Hide last Sunday.
Bird-wise the reserve continues to be a little quiet. We're still regularly seeing lots of ducks on the low ground though, and six bean geese were about on Sunday. The Brambling is still visiting the feeders, as is the woodpecker, and the Grey Heron, who seems to think under the office feeder is an ideal place for a quiet nap every so often.