. . . on Saturday morning as I was driving to Rye Meads up Therfield Heath, a juvenile gannet flew across the road in front of me. I've just submitted the record to the Herts Bird Club. I hadn't been drinking, honest!

Joan

Rye Meads Site Manager

Five buzzards soared over the reserve this afternoon, perfectly set against a blue sky with fluffy white clouds.

Also green sandpiper, snipe, water rail and a redshank (briefly). Chiffchaff singing.

Lovely sunny day for walk!

Joan

Site Manager

There's a garganey at Rye Meads today - you can see it from the Gadwall Hide.

Come and have a look!

Joan

Rye Meads Site Manager

Good morning!

How are you today?

 Just a quick post about some of the wildlife highlights for yesterday.

 

We had some lovely views of hobby flying over the Draper hide hunting dragonflies

 

 

 

 

The garganey is back at the Tern hide. Keep an eye out at the Tern hide you never know what you might see from there at the moment. In winter we lower the water level on this lagoon so you can see the islands - we also…

Morning all,

How are you?

I just wanted to tell you about one of our lovely young Wildlife Explorers members Amelie! Amelie comes along to all out Wildlife Explorer Club meetings  - it's a club for children aged between 6-11 to explore nature and have fun! We meet once a month and do loads of different activities! All our club meetings are listed on the Rye  Meads events page, check them out by clicking here!

 

…

Hi everyone,

How are you?

 

Just so you know the Warbler hide is closed for now. The ramp needs some love and attention and we will have it open as soon as we can.
The path up to the hide is still open so you can still walk along that path to try and spot warblers!

Good afternoon everyone,

how are you?

Just wanted to do a quick up date about some of the wildlife highlights that have been about today...

We've had brilliant views of: teal, shoveler, tufted duck, mallard, gadwall, mute swan, Canada geese, grey heron, cormorant, little grebe, green sandpiper, snipe, lapwing, wren, robin, dunnock, blackbird, blue tit, great tit, long tailed tit, greenfinch, and chaffinch.

The…

Morning!

How are you all today?

So, I haven't interviewed a volunteer for a while so I thought it was time to do the next in the mini series about the "people of Rye Meads".  There is more to a nature reserve than just the wildlife - it takes just shy of 100 volounteers to keep Rye Meads a special place!

So here we are interviewing Tom Mason:

What do you do at Rye Meads?
Lots! I am one of the leaders for…

Morning all

How are you?

So I posted a couple of pictures I took over our 10th Birthday Bash, but I thought I would give you a few more pictures and tell you all that happened over the weekend!

 

So the exciting news was that the baby kingfishers at the Kingfisher hide fledged that morning!
Visitors were lucky enough to see the fledging (they go so quick - one visit was telling me it was "blink and you miss it" quick…

Hello!

How are you?

Just a couple of quick pictures of our birthday bash so far...

 Some of us are in our best party frocks too! Well, the boys are in suits, but still!

 

  Steve Kershaw Wildlife Art

 

 RSPB sales

 

 

 Paradise Wildlife Park have been here this morning with some wildlife - including this barn owl!

 

 Tom Mason Photography

 

 Keith Bedford Photography

 

 Luke from the Herts and Middlesex Wildlife…

Afternoon all,

how are you?

Quick post - the kingfishers fledged this morning! We've seen two babies in the surrounding bushes!

 

Woohoo!

It's our birthday - help us celebrate!

 Come along tomorrow and join the party!

 

The visitors centre is 10 years old this year and we are going to have a birthday party! And you are all invited!

Plase come along and help us celebrate!

On Sunday 9 September we are going to have an open day! We'll have lots of stalls - below are some of the fabulous people that will be here on Sunday 9 September:

 

 

 

 

 

…

Hi everyone, how are you?

Last Saturday we spotted this piece in the Times, by Simon Barnes.

have a read - it's a very interesting piece - and keep an eye out for the Rye Meads mention!

Good morning you lovely people,

How are you?

 

I wanted to share a picture that a very lucky visitor took on Sunday:

 Brilliant picture by Peter Hewitt

 

 

The harrier was hunting ove rthe meadow and made it's way over to the Tern hide - where it was mobbed by crows!

Brilliant bird!

 

Thanks for sharing Peter!

There is a marsh harrier flying over the meadow right now!

Woohoo!

More info when we find out!

 Click on the picture to go to the RSPB website and find out more information about marsh harrier

Hi everyone.
Here is a blog from one of Rye Meads' volunteers, Lucy! She wanted to tell you about the holiday activities that we run at Rye Meads:

 

Hi!
My name is Lucy. I first came to Rye Meads with my Mum and little sister. We saw a poster about an event over the school holidays: the Wacky Wildlife Adventures. It sounded good, so that summer I joined in, and from the age of six I haven't looked back! Now I have progressed…

Hello again!

How are you?

Just a quick email to give you a kingfisher update.

The kingfishers are still feeding young at the moment. They are taking fish into the bank every 20-25 minutes or so.
This is the best time to see kingfishers, once they've fledged the babies will hide away deep in bushes. We think they will fledge around the 5 September!

Here's a couple of pictures visitors have taken recently:

 This…

Hi everyone,

how are you?

I just wanted to do a quick list of the different wildlife that we saw in August at Rye Meads!

So here we go:

 Water birds and waders
Common tern, black headed gull, lesser black backed gull, coot, moorhen, grey heron, little egret, cormorant, pochard, gadwall, mallard, tufted duck, garganey (it's been hanging around for a bit, we first saw it on the 19th and we get glimpses of it every couple…

It's our birthday - help us celebrate!

 

The visitors centre is 10 years old this year and we are going to have a birthday party! And you are all invited!

Plase come along and help us celebrate!

On Sunday 9 September we are going to have an open day! We'll have lots of stalls - below are some of the fabulous people that will be here on Sunday 9 September:

 

 

 

Steve Kershaw will be here again with his fabulous…

Good morning everyone,

How are you?

Just thought I would give you some of the wildlife highlights from over the bank holiday weekend!

 

Greenshank

 

 

Green sandpiper

 

 

 

 

Common sandpiper

 

 

 

 

Lapwing

 

 

 

Snipe

 

 

 

Garganey

 

 

 

Kingfisher - they are still taking fish into the bank for the babies! We've had lovely views this weekend

 

 

 

House martin

 

 

 

Swallow

 

 

 

That…

Hi everyone,

Just wanted to say SORRY to Malcolm - I miss labeled one of his photos...

This is actually Malcolm Housden's stunning shot of kingfisher:

 

He took another lovely shot on Thursday:

 

Thanks for sharing Malcolm!

 

If you would like the amazing opportunity to see kingfishers (and all the other lovely wildlife at the reserve) before our opening times have a read of this:

 Great shot by Malcolm Housden

Rye Meads nature reserve is opening early for 10 lucky people on Sunday 26 August from 7-10 am (although you don't have to leave at 10am, you can stay all day if you wanted!), this opportunity for RSPB members only (or join on the…

Hi everyone,

How are you?

You may know that over the school holidays we run an educational scheme for children aged 7-13. Well today the kids went out with the camera... and I thought I would share some of their photos!

These are all pictures taken by the children on today's Wacky Wildlife Adventures, all of things that they like on the reserve:

 

Aren't they great!

Good morning kingfisher fans!

how are you?

I just wanted to share a couple of pictures that a visitors took over the weekend.
The kingfishers (from the Kingfisher Hide) are feeding young - which is very exciting as it is a good time to see these amazing birds!

Over the weekend they were feeding the young, and visitor Geoff Harries got these lovely shots!

 

 Thanks for sharing Geoff!

Hi all,

How are you today? Rather hot?

Hope you are all drinking lots of water!

 

Just thought I would let you know some of today's wildlife highlights!

Black tailed godwit

 

 

 

 

Snipe

 

 

 

Lapwing

 

 

 

 

Green sandpiper (there was 7 yesterday!)

 

 

Garganey

 

 

 

 

Little egret

 

 

 

 

and swallow!