Spring has left us with the start of summer bringing out the prime in nature. Wildlife is flourishing and at the beginning of June Saltholme is coming into a time where plant growth is high and baby animals are appearing all over the reserve. The blue tit chicks, the sand martin bank and common terns on the raft all accessible to see via the monitors in the Visitors centre. The fox cubs are about the reserve and whilst working today there was a little grebe mother with chicks going across the water and into the reeds again.
We have created a new extension for the pond dipping events meaning even more people can use the different position to pond dip from, other to the wooden walkways and the earlier paved area. Pond dipping is a great event which is popular at Saltholme, the reserve has great facilities for pond dipping with platforms to search the waters for its enormous amount of life. The life under the water includes the likes of waterboatman, pond skaters and water scorpions. I also saw a moorhen on the other walkway searching for food along with a pair of tufted ducks in the ponds.
The new section for pond dipping means it can be done alongside the dipping areas that are located around the ponds. It is a small paved area that gives you access to look closely at the pond life. My photo shows Alex (left) and Peter (right) finishing off the work we did from today, along with Brian, Daniel, Dean and Ian.
Also keep up to date with the recent sightings blog because our sighting board was packed full of wildlife to see at the reserve today.
- Josh McGowan