We were recently the beneficiary of funding supplied within the Birmingham & Black Country Nature Improvement Area project. Visitors to our reserve will notice straight away the work achieved in a little under 2 weeks. Our reserve has been given a new lease of life and general opinion is that a good job has been done.

Most noticeable is the work carried out on landscaping the existing island in Forge Mill Lake. The…

Staff news

Many of you may have noticed by now that our wonderful Wendy Murray is expecting a baby.   Wendy’s last day in the classroom/office will be Friday 20^th December.  We know you will join us in wishing her well and Wendy – we are looking forward to meeting your ‘baby bird’ in the new year!

 Did you know?   We are recruiting for a Community and Volunteer Development Officer at Sandwell Valley…

Over the past few weeks the focus of attention for our volunteers has been the re-establishing of the old pond. A combination of brute force, hard work and an element of stubborness has led to a successful conclusion. They've made a great job of it and we pass on our thanks to all involved.

Last week, our Holiday Wildlife club taster day was a huge success lots of families turning up to enjoy the sunshine and a glass of woodland berry pop at Sandwell Valley.

Inquisitive children with nets and bug pots in hand, set off to explore our minibeast meadow and they were not disappointed! The Bug Hunt was a huge success as bees, moths, damselflies, beetles, ladybirds, frogs and more were discovered. The children…

On Thursday last week, 30 nursery students explored Sandwell Valley using all their senses and were amazed at the different smells that green leaves can have in the herb garden, the sights and sounds and the feel of the the old oak tree as they gave it a huge hug. As we walked back from the bird hide, with faces aloft and tongues out catching the rain, over the troll bridge and past the crotchety croc (his nose has been…

We hosted our regular 'first Saturday of the month' guided walk today. Here are our sightings:

Mute Swan

Canada Goose

Mallard

Gadwall

Tufted Duck

Pochard

Great Crested Grebe

Coot

Moorhen

Grey Heron

Lapwing

Oystercatcher

Little Ringed Plover

Common Sandpiper

Blackbird

Song Thrush

Woodpigeon

Lesser Black-Backed Gull

Herring Gull

Common Tern

Magpie

Jay

Carrion Crow

Jackdaw

Blue Tit

Great…

Sandwell Valley Reserve Volunteer Update

Winter 2013

Crunching through the snow last week and looking out across the frozen lake and marsh there was no mistake that this was proper winter weather. The speed at which the bullfinches returned to the feeders after I had topped them up also confirmed how hard it is for our wildlife when temperatures plummet and snow covers their food. It is an attractive and exciting time…

How about this for a Christmas present for our reserve - our volunteers carried out a snipe count in the marsh today and to their great delight they counted 40 common snipe and 4 Jack snipe. Add this to a further 20 common snip seen on the island and our reserve currently hosts a healthy colony of these fascinating birds.

These numbers far exceeded the expectations they had for the numbers of birds hiding amongst the…

I'm on duty today and the reserve is fairly quiet so I took the opportunity to have a walk around the reserve accompanied by Alf, one of our regular Saturday volunteers. The weather is dry but there's a chill breeze picking up.

Birdlife was surprisingly sparse, maybe the weather has forced birds to take cover. We spotted a thrush (couldn't decide if it was a song or mistle), saw a redwing fly overhead, a jay…

Over the course of the winter months the office and hide will no longer be open on Thursdays. This is only a temporary measure and normal service will be resumed from Easter onwards.

We apologise if this causes some inconvenience.

I received reports all day from anxious visitors who were concerned about the large deposits of litter seen in Forge Mill Lake close to our hide.

I had to reassure them that no, it wasn't someone's shed roof that had been thrown in it was in fact our newly constructed tern rafts.

Last week our volunteers, helped by a contingent of students from Birmingham University, built two large wooden rafts and they were both…

Greetings and I hope that you are surviving the first few biting days of the winter chill. While there are still colourful leaves on the trees there is a lovely feeling of change in the air and around the reserve the winter residents and visitors are certainly the main performers. I noticed that the goosander have been perching on the old boom and providing good views from the hide and viewing screen. The snipe have been…

As many of our regular visitors will have observed, the resident male swan on Forge Mill Lake is a bit of a brute. Some volunteers have even christened him 'Attila the Swan' because of his aggressive behaviour.

A few weeks ago during a quiet Saturday afternoon in the hide it was observed that 'Attila' was in fact wearing a ring on his leg. It is one of those things that I had assumed someone else had reported…

We provided the venue for forty sixteen year olds to experience conservation work her at Sandwell Valley.

Arriving at some unearthly hour on a Saturday morning (10am!) We soon had them warming up, stretching and then getting kitted out for a full days work in the field. An alien activity to many.

They were all taking part in the final project of the summer which involved these young adults giving back to society …

We recently hosted a very popular bird ringing event here at Sandwell. Our Warden, Stefan is a very keen bird ringer and jumps at every opportunity to indulge.

Attended by over 30 children and big children - it was the perfect chance to get up close and personal to a variety of birds.

Young and old had the chance to hold great tits, blue tits, willow tits and dunnocks. What a thrilling experience - I guess we'll have…

In addition to the breeding successes mentioned in previous reports the first tufted ducklings emerged from the undergrowth on the island (25^th.). Further broods of lapwing, mallard, moorhen and coot also appeared. Unfortunately some chicks have proved vulnerable the numerous marauding lesser black-backed gulls.

The little-ringed plover chicks have both fledged successfully, as has the common tern chick and the family…

On what is proving to be a very busy weekend at Sandwell Valley nature reserve, tomorrow evening we host our annual Bat & Moth night.

Always a very popular event and this year is proving to be no exception. Already heavily booked, we may have room for a few more so please contact the reserve office to book your place.

On show this year will be a number of baby bats brought along by Morgan Bowers who runs a local…

This coming weekend staff and volunteers from our reserve will be entertaining thousands of youngsters as the BBC roadshow hits town.

The main attraction will be the shows given by Mr Bloom (a popular character from CBeebies who encourages children to grow their own) he is the Alan Titchmarsh of children's television.

We will be responsible for running the ever popular pond dipping and minibeast hunts so why not…

Last night we had the opportunity to talk to the appointed architects for the proposed new visitor centre here at Sandwell.

Twenty volunteers joined RSPB staff for our “Meet the Architect” event last night.  Four hours of very interesting and detailed discussions helped fill seven flipcharts with ideas, and many pages of notes were taken away by our architect team.   

 Many thanks for everyone who took part…

Hi All,

 Before I waffle on if you have not yet filled in a questionnaire about the future development of Sandwell RSPB you can do so online at https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/P7WZQDX Even if you have done one perhaps you could add extra value for us by circulating the link to any friends, family or other contacts that you think might have a view on the reserve future. We are particularly interested in people that would…

An exciting breeding success has been the hatching of 3 chicks to a pair of little-ringed plover (19^th.). The nest had been in a scrape on the new levelled out marsh area and they have been the first successful lrp’s in several years. Two of the chicks have successfully survived. Also the common tern pair produced a single chick (8^th.), which has grown rapidly with all the fish being brought to it regularly by its…

4 pm to 8 pm on Thursday 26 July at RSPB Sandwell Valley’s classroom

Plans for the re-development of your nature centre are taking shape.

We have appointed Ian Bramble as the architect to develop a design for the new centre. Ian is a Birmingham-based architect with plenty of experience of building design and construction in the area.

Please come along and discuss your thoughts about the building with…

The funding application for the proposed new visitor centre is now well under way and to help it along it's way we need your help please.

On the reserve this week is a representative of the company helping us steer a path through all the paperwork involved.

Fiona King is working for Barker-Langham who in turn are integral to the application process. Fiona is chatting to people about what events and activities they…

Around the reserve:

Hmm, where exactly did spring go and have we seen the last of summer? I hope not. At least while we have been bemoaning the recent wet weather the wildlife around the valley has been cracking on and producing! The lapwings on the island have chicks but lost in the vegetation it is hard to keep count. We know that there are at least four but it could be more. What seems likely though is that some will…

 There have been several successful hatchings during the month with the mute swan pair producing 7 cygnets (11^th.), although one of them didn’t survive, 4 lapwing chicks have been seen so far, the oystercatcher pair had 3 robust chicks (5^th.) and a few pairs of canada geese were also successful. Also seen were a coot with 6 chicks (26^th), a robin with 4 young and a juvenile pied wagtail. The numerous lesser black…