What a difference over the last couple of days. It's finally starting to feel like winter. Like most of the country, we had a bit of snow yesterday - just enough to turn everything white for a few hours. And the sharp frost this morning left some of the smaller reedbed pools frozen for the first time this winter.
Luckily we had clear skies last night, as about 50 people came along to our first star gazing event of the year. Hopefully it will stay clear tonight too for part two of this event.
With the arrival of the colder weather, the feeders have been even busier than usual, while a few redwings have moved into South Belt to forage among the leaf litter. Goldcrests and bullfinches are being seen regularly too. We found a firecrest roosting near the Discovery Centre on Wednesday evening, and a chiffchaff hs again been seen in the Bittern Hide area this morning.
Firecrest by Angie Knight
In the reedbed, there are regular sightings of bitterns and several marsh harriers, while kingfishers were seen at both Bittern Hide and Island Mere today. A couple of bearded tits popped out into the open at Island Mere, and a Cetti's warbler gave a rare sighting int he open near Bittern Hide. On the mere itself, four whooper swans were present this morning, having moved from their favoured reedbed pools behind Wildlife Lookout.
Large flocks of ducks remain on the Scrape, including a notable count of 14 pintails this morning. Apart from lapwings and a small flock of dunlins, most of the waders appear to have moved on, but our first ruff of 2016 was spotted on Thursday. Gull numbers have declined a little too in recent days.
The Bewick's swans have become less regular, but a nice flock of white-fronted geese have taken up residence on the South Levels, peaking at 27 birds yesterday. Two tundra bean geese were present for a few days too.
Depending on the weather conditions, seawatching can be very productive, and sightings in the last week have included two black-necked grebes last Sunday, a little auk on Monday, occasional great and pomarine skuas and both eider and velvet scoter as well as the more expected common scoters, red-throated divers and great crested grebes.
Hopefully this cold weather will encourage more birds into your gardens over the next few weeks, helping you to make some good counts for the Big Garden Birdwatch. If you still need some advice on garden bird feeding then why not come to our garden bird festival next weekend.
A blue tit in snowier conditions than so far this year by Jon Evans