I hope that everyone had an enjoyable and relaxing break over Christmas. It's such a shame that the weather wasn't always conducive to a lovely family walk, though lots of you certainly took the opportunity when the wind dropped and the sky cleared.
As I type, I can still hear the wind whistling through the trees outside as Storm Eleanor passes over. It's certainly been a blustery day, and as a precaution we have had to close the woodland paths today, including the path from the visitor centre to Bittern Hide. We hope to reopen that path tomorrow, once the winds have eased.
The recent heavy rainfall has also had an impact. Floods affected several local roads this morning, and with more rain forecast tomorrow please take care if you are driving here, especially on the Blythburgh to Westleton road and at Eastbridge. The rising waters have also forced us to close the path from South Belt Crossroads to the Sluice. This path may remain closed for a couple of days.
Don't let these path closures stop you from visiting us though, as you can still view the Scrape from North and East Hides and the Public Viewpoint, while Island Mere has remained accessible via Whin Hill. There have certainly been some good birds to spot already this year too.
The scarcest visitor so far has been the first year glaucous gull that is commuting between the Scrape and beach, as well as further along the coast towards Sizewell. It has given some birdwatchers the run around, but hopefully this huge Arctic-breeding gull will remain for several weeks.
A similar first year glaucous gull photographed by Charles Cuthbert last January
Two great white egrets seen in North Marsh on New Year's Day were probably two of the three birds that been spending the winter at nearby Dingle Marshes. With luck they'll put in another appearance at Minsmere soon.
Two young otters were watched fishing in North Marsh yesterday, while an adult spent more than an hour in view at Island Mere on New Year's Day. The Island Mere bittern is still parading around in the open on a regular basis, though his previous favoured area is now underwater so he's fishing a little farther from the hide.
Unfortunately the large starling murmuration at Island Mere was last seen on Christmas Eve, with at least part of the flock now roosting at Dingle Marshes - though that's not an easy site to access, and particularly when walking back to your car after dark. However, it's still worth staying late at Island Mere as we have up to 24 marsh harriers roosting every evening. Other sightings there over the last few days have included four goosanders, kingfisher, bearded tits, sparrowhawk, cormorants and mute swans, while a Cetti's warbler was singing yesterday.
Goosanders by Jon Evans
The glaucous gull was far from the only highlight on the Scrape either. The drake mandarin remains and up to seven pintails have been seen among the huge flocks of wigeons, gadwalls, shovelers, mallards and teals. Apart from lapwings and snipe, we never expect to see many waders at Minsmere in winter, but despite this there have been sightings of one or two dunlins, knots, ringed plovers, redshanks and curlews over the holiday period.
A small flock of white-fronted geese were seen on New Year's Day - probably part of the flock that spends the winter at nearby RSPB North Warren.
Birds of prey seen so far this year include marsh harriers, kestrels, sparrowhawks and the very pale buzzard that has become a regular. The highlights among the woodland birds have included bullfinches, 100+ siskins, treecreepers, nuthatch, marsh tits and redwings, while a great spotted woodpecker has been a regular on the visitor centre feeders.
My own personal highlight so far was a badger that scuttled across the road at Scotts Hall as I left the reserve after dark last night. Hopefully a sign of things to come. What else will 2018 bring?
A badger by Jon Evans. Although one of our harder to see species due to their nocturnal behaviour, you may be lucky around dusk, and you can often find their droppings in the woods.