A slightly different view of the reserve... This photo is taken looking towards the hide from the West side of the huge Ashgrave field. It clearly shows the large 'secret' lagoon on the hill, which you can just about glimpse from the hide and which you can get views of from the path that goes around the outside of Ashgrave.

The muddy edges of the lagoon are providing lots of feeding oppurtunities and the greenshank…

Migrating birds are still passing through the moor at the moment on their way to their breeding grounds. I saw four hobbies hunting for large insects over the reedbed yesterday and a wheatear was hopping around out on the Ashgrave field, proudly showing off it’s prominent white rump as it flew from tussock to tussock. We were also lucky enough to see a greenshank on the lagoon on Ashgrave, as well as three ringed plover…

Spring is always one of our busiest times on Otmoor, on top of the usual reserve and habitat management work we also carry out bird surveys over the whole of the moor and put a lot of effort into monitoring the ground nesting wading birds (lapwing, snipe, curlew and redshank).

Our surveys cover not only the RSPB reserve area but also the MOD land and a number of fields owned by private land owners. These surveys allow…

In terms of wildlife, the reserve is an exciting place to be at the moment. Bumblebees and butterflies are on the wing (I saw brimstone, comma and tortoiseshell yesterday) and lots of the birds that migrate back to the UK in the spring time are being seen on and over the moor. These birds include yellow wagtails, willow warblers, whitethroats, grasshopper warblers, sedge warblers, swallows and house martins. The hares…

Otmoor is a great place for seeing brown hares. They are very active at this time of year and with the grass being so short in the fields at the moment you can often get really good views of them. Saying that though, they can also be very very good at hiding, hunkering down and sitting very still until you get very close to them. This happened to me yesterday out in the Big Otmoor field... Can you spot the hare in the…

We are very lucky on Otmoor to have a very healthy breeding population of lapwings. These iconic birds have suffered from changes in agriculture, land drainage, building on flood plains and global warming. In fact in England numbers have declined by 37% since 1982. Because of this, these birds are lucky to have Otmoor available to them as a protected haven. We put a lot of effort into getting conditions just right on…

Anyone visiting Otmoor at the moment should be prepared for very cold, biting winds. There isn’t much shelter on the reserve and so the wind can cuts right across the wetland fields. Despite the chilly weather however, there are some signs of spring. The lapwings have started nesting and some of the bird species that have wisely spent their winter in the warm climes of Africa are starting to reappear on Otmoor. Wheatear…

Although trying to see an otter on Otmoor can be like trying to find a hairy needle in a  haystack, these elusive beasties in recent years have been making good use of the reserve. The reedbed and the ditches running up alongside the bridleway seem to be the best places to see them, although a good deal of luck is required!!

Some nice photos have been taken of the otters and we were lucky enough to get some video footage…

We’ve been so busy at Otmoor recently our blog has been very neglected! Hopefully we can get it back on track from now on.

Some exciting news at the moment comes in the form of a rare duck that is currently sheltering in the Otmoor reedbed. Normally found in Eastern Europe and Asia the ferruginous duck (named after the iron colour of its plumage) seems quite happy lurking along the edges of the reed islands and…

This is quite old information now but the Wetland Bird Survey results from the start of January were:

Mute swan:   21
European white-fronted goose:   3
Greylag goose:   172
Canada goose:   263
Wigeon:   1260
Gadwall:   16
Teal:   1305
Mallard:   246
Pintail:   4
Shoveler:   4
Pochard:   1
Tufted duck:   28
Little egret:   6
Grey heron:   5
Coot:   54
Golden plover:   450
Lapwing:   973
Snipe:   14

At the moment there is a lot of snow on the reserve, so everything is…

Everywhere is white, frozen, cold and wet, it may look pretty but these conditions are extremely tough on wildlife. Finding food becomes more difficult and surviving each night becomes uncertain. Small mammals are hidden in tunnels under the snow, keeping warm under ground, making it difficult for the raptors to find them, meaning they would need to rely on others food sources which may also be scarce. Large mammals will…

After a very wet December, water levels on the moor are at a record high. Short term flooding benefits flood plains by in fluxing an area with nutrients from the over spilled river. Long term flooding can however be detrimental to the soil, leaving earthworms and insects to drown.

Wading birds such as Lapwing and Redshank probe the soil with their bills and feed on insects within the soil. Long term flooding will remove…

Every 2 weeks all the Otmoor staff rise at the crack of dawn to carry out a Wetalnd Bird Survey. The results of this are very important and allow us to monitor how wetland birds are doing and whether our management is heading in the right direction. We usually split up, allowing each of us to concentrate on one particular area of the reserve... Just as well, otherwise it would take all day!

The results of yesterdays WeBS…

We were up nice and early again on Monday to carry out the Wetland Bird Survey for December. We each had a separate area of the reserve to cover and the results are shown below. Wigeon, golden plover and lapwing numbers were the highest recorded yet this winter and will hopefully continue to rise. The main mass of birds seem to keep changing their favourite area to feed on the reserve, but at the moment the NE corner…

Staff from Southern Electric Power Distribution braved the cold icy conditions yesterday to help save birds on Otmoor nature reserve.

Bright tags are being installed on power lines to make them more visible and prevent bird fatalities.At times of poor visibility, geese and swans have been flying into the overhead power line by a pond, close to Noke, causing injury and even death.

Some birds, primarily swans and geese…

Many of you have seen the flooding across Otmoor. As well as impacting on people and agriculture, the flooding also has a major impact on the wildlife found on the reserve. 

On the surface all looks well, with large numbers of ducks, gulls and lapwings feeding on the flooded fields.  However this flood water is causing major damage under the surface.

Creatures that live in the soil such as earthworms can only withstand…

Possibly not quite as exciting as Zoe's last blog posting about her flight over Otmoor, but here are the results from the latest Wetland Bird Survey on the moor. A combination of lots of water elsewhere and the freezing temperatures causing areas of the reserve to freeze over probably explain the drop in wildfowl numbers, especially shoveler and wigeon:

Little Egret                 1 (Big Otmoor)

Grey Heron                4 (1 Malt Pit, 1 Ashgrave…

I may be a little late writing this as I flew over Otmoor on the 11^th November but I want to share my experience and some of the photos with Otmoor’s followers. It is all thanks to one of our lovely volunteers and her very generous friend that I had this opportunity as well as being the only one in the office with a decent camera! With the plane being a small 2 seater I was a little apprehensive as I had only been on…

Water levels are now even higher on the moor than yesterday and all the RSPB managed fields are well above target for this time of year. This did however mean that today we were able to float our tern raft back out into deeper water in the reedbed. A couple of months ago we grounded it close to the shore to allow us to carry out some maintenance work, but we'e had to wait for levels to rise again before we could get it…

With all the rain we’ve had it seemed a wise idea to have a good wander round the moor today so see what was going on. There’s an awful lot of water about, with all the fields on the reserve having higher levels then I’d ever seen before. The bridleway down from Noke was about 2 feet under water and it was almost creeping into the pump house. To try and drain this bridleway and to save our precious electrics…

After getting the quad bike wedged between 2 thorn bushes and then stuck in some very deep mud last Friday, I managed to survive the weekend without incident and was in bright and early today for the WeBS (Wetland Bird Survey) count. Three of us went out to different areas of the reserve and the final results including numbers in each field were...

Little grebe 1 (Reedbed)

Little egret 2 (Ashgrave)

Grey heron 4 (1 Flood…

As well as willow coppicing, now is also the time of year when we start doing our hedgerow management. This mainly involves coppicing but we also do a bit of hedge laying and sometimes some flailing too. There are a number of reasons we manage the hedgerows, not only does it keep them thick and healthy, providing more shelter and food for the animals that use them, but it also allows ensures the hedges don’t get too tall…

It's that time of year again when the volunteers are down on the reserve, come rain or shine, hard at work carrying out the annual willow coppice. Coppicing is a traditional technique which helps extend the life of the tree, providing more firewood and of providing long thin branches which can be used for a variety of purposes. The main reason we carry it out however is because it has the additional benefit of producing…

Those of you who've visited the reserve recently will have seen that a new footpath has opened through the carpark field. It will probably get a bit muddy, but makes a nice change to the usual walk along the track up to the bird feeders. The path snakes it's way through the field and provides a good oppurtunity to see part of the reserve that's normally closed to the public. The field is full of hawthorns, which are currently…

The bird feeding area on Otmoor is always very popular, not only with birds but also with people, allowing them to get nice close views of the tits, finches and buntings. The old feeling station was starting to look tatty so we decided it was time for a change. The Wednesday volunteer team we tasked with the job of constructing the new feeding station and I’m sure everyone will be really pleased with the results. Although…