Let’s begin with a flood update – the water is currently receding and, for the first time in a little while, you can now complete the full circuit of the wetlands trail, visiting all 4 of the hides. I’d suggest that you wear wellies (or at least walking boots) and expect to get a little muddy, especially in the section near Winpenny hide. If you venture down through Hanger wood to Nettley’s hide take a look at the tide mark and you’ll see that the hide was almost up to it’s windows in flood water. Whilst you don’t have to paddle at the moment, the floor is a bit wet and slippery so do take care and make sure you only have mud on your boots and not on your bottom!
A rather intriguing wildlife phenomena seems to be resulting from the receding water – we’ve been finding record numbers of grey herons lined up along the edge of the floods. We suspect that they’re after any fish who have been stranded in the pools. Today’s total reached 32 so I guess if you are a fish, the collective noun of a ‘siege of herons’ makes absolute sense!
In addition to our usual collection of dabbling ducks – wigeon, teal, shoveler, pintail and shelduck – there have been a few of the diving variety including tufted duck, pochard and even a drake goldeneye. With a little bit of dry land we are finding a small number of waders – ruff, black-tailed godwit and snipe all being reported in the past few days.
Around the nature trail itself, particularly during the sunnier spells, our resident birds have started to sing. On my brief walk yesterday morning, I was serenaded by skylark, dunnock, wren, blackbird, song thrush, bullfinch, great tits, blue tits and greenfinch. The noise from our flock of linnets was almost deafening – they were chattering noisily from the birches along the zig zag path. Our female kestrel is sticking to hunting ground close to the visitor centre and you could also see buzzard and red kite. We had fantastic views of a red kite and 3 buzzards simultaneously yesterday lunchtime.
Out on the wooded heath, we’re undertaking some construction work before the bird-nesting season gets underway. A new chain of pools are being created, running from the 3 way junction down towards black pond. These pools should be great for dragonflies including the small red damselfly and black darter. These are both heathland specialists who have arrived at Pulborough Brooks in the last couple of years. As well as creating more habitat for these fantastic creatures, we’re also working on making them easier for you to view.
Whilst the mild temperatures this winter has meant that birds have been relying less on our gardens than in some years, many of our visitors have reported that there has been an increase in birds using their feeders over the last couple of weeks. If they are thinking of finding a mate and starting to breed, they will need plenty of energy to keep in the best shape! So take advantage of our great bird seed offer - all of our 12.75 kg sacks of bird seed (excluding peanuts) currently have a 20% discount. The offer is available for another week (until 04 March 2014) so why not stock up for the spring.