We have all been working really hard over the last weekend to make our Springwatch Weekend a real success! We had all sorts of events from a spider walk (a walk looking at spiders, not everybody walking around like spiders!) to a bird ringing demonstration.
The real success of the weekend was our bat and moth walk on Saturday night which got everybody great views of Britain’s largest bat, the Noctule bat. These were flying around high above the reserve feeding on the thousands of midges which we all noticed whilst visiting the moth trap! Plus we saw the fantastic Daubenton’s bat which was feeding low over the water. There were a few moths about but not as many as I hoped. But by the morning the trap accumulated over 250 moths and over 40 species!
The real event of the weekend was the footage we got from our remote camera’s which are out on the reserve. Firstly we captured a few Roe Deer wandering by, then a fox that strolled past followed by one of radipole’s recent arrivals. We’ve filmed these animals in the past and I’ve probably mentioned them on the blog before but I am of course on about Otters. During the ringing demo a volunteer and myself noticed a nice fresh blob of otter spraint right in front of the camera. Nick then checked the footage and RESULT! We filmed an otter having a poo!
Sundays spider walk was also a success with everyone seeing spiders and everybody managed to catch plenty of bugs during the afternoon. Including the capture of a Long jawed orb weaver spider! So I would like to thank everybody who helped with the weekend!