Mowing and clearing is now well underway all around the reserve. Work is ongoing both in Jubilee and around the North Pools and, hopefully, is not causing too much disturbance to the birds or to our human visitors.

Paul, who I work along side, has been busy harvesting the flower seeds over the last few weeks and he has spent quite a lot of time removing them from the pods/cases ready for planting. We’re going to be “autumn cleaning” the car park in the next week or two; tidying up round the edges and round the saplings and getting some of the wild flower seeds down.

I can’t rave about the flowers anymore but the fungi are now showing up so I shall probably start raving about those instead.

So I’ll make a start!!

(Photo by Jenny Stevens)

Can you believe that this lovely shaggy ink cap (above) turns into this mess (below) within a very short space of time?

(Photo by Pam Dalley)

I don't know a lot about fungi but I do find it fascinating that so many plants rely on the underground structure of these guys to grow into strong healthy plants.  Trees particularly wouldn't grow so well without them.

There’s still plenty to of lovely things to see with this migrant hawker seen a couple of weeks ago.

(Photo by Colin Sedgewick)

The best sighting has got to be that a bittern has been seen over recent weeks, mostly along the ditch on the west side of the wetlands, that’s the canal side.  Keep your eyes open and keep us informed of any more sightings.

All for now.

Happy hunting.