Our popular hobby family have taken over The Lodge headlines in the last few weeks, but there is plenty of other wildlife and happenings on the reserve! A family of common lizards have popped up on a dead log beside the Visitor Information Centre and are becoming little stars, being so easy to see. Terry Murfitt and Gill Butt took these great images of the lizards basking this week.
Image credit;Gill Butt Image credit; Terry Murfitt
Despite the torrential rain in the evening on Saturday, we went ahead with our Big Wild Sleepout event and managed to set up and break camp in the dry. We even enjoyed some sunshine, especially on Sunday morning. However, it was very soggy in between!-but we still managed to go out on the bat and twilight walks, the Sandy Astronomical Society improvised with a great talk on the night skies and we managed to get the camp fire going well- ending the evening with toasted marshmallows and fireside chats in the deluge! The moth trap was set -up overnight, and a both a lime and poplar hawk moth were discovered next morning.
We are now setting the moth trap up each night, and Lizzie and Beth, joined from Matt from HQ, are checking and identifying the moths each morning, so a nice start to the day for all of us!
The first mini-beast safari of the hols went out today and a great group of children (and adults) found newts, the common lizards, spiders with eggs and many other little creepies on the walk.
Just a few days left now before the hobbies will fledge- probably sometime shortly after the weekend, but I'll keep you posted on the latest!