After a busy bank holiday weekend, work on the reserve has resumed as normal. The wardens have been busy finishing their annual reports and everyone else is cracking on with reserve tasks. For Ricky and I, today this meant wading out into the reedbed to install the final 3 bearded tit nest ‘boxes’ near South Hide and stacking the remaining winter-felled timber in the yard amongst other things. Other members of staff have been carrying out livestock checks and finishing stone curlew fences.  The team in the visitor centre and cafe are doing a grand job keeping visitors entertained through this busy holiday period.

 

Spring seems to have finally arrived in Suffolk! It’s been a beautiful, warm day on the reserve and the local wildlife has responded well to it. Today’s highlights have included a sedge warbler singing by West Hide and the sand martins re-excavating their burrows on the sand cliff behind the visitor centre. Well worth a look!

 

Bird sightings from today include:

 

The Scrape and Levels:

  • Mediterranean gulls – at least eight
  • Little gulls – three smart adults
  • Caspian gull
  • Little egret
  • Pintail
  • Ringed plover
  • Avocets
  • Ruffs
  • Sedge warbler – singing behind West Hide

 

The Reedbed and Island Mere:

  • Bittern – four+ booming today
  • House martins
  • Marsh harriers
  • Reed buntings

 

Elsewhere:

  • White wagtails
  • Little tern (the first?)
  • Sand martins – 30+ excavating their burrows in the sand martin cliff
  • Coal tits
  • Marsh tit
  • Treecreeper
  • Nuthatch