Yes our wicked little black and white vandals have been at again, churning up about 70 metres of one of my beautifully maintained Woodchip paths. There must have been some juicy earthworms brought up by the recent rain, too tempting for our little badgers

A bit of time required with the rake to repair the path, with the cold weather coming I suppose the work will keep me warm!

I arrived this morning at the reserve to be greeted by two old friends.

Charles and Camilla are back after nearly 5 months spent on the Wansbeck raising their youngsters. I’m not sure where the youngsters are now, they maybe still on the Wansbeck or they may have been taken away and dumped by mum and dad.

Hopefully this means they are back to start a new family of cygnets next spring.

Our bird ringing group were in yesterday and had a successful session, catching a nice variety of birds.

Marsh Tits

Tree Sparrow

Tree Creeper

Wren

Blue Tit

Great Tit

Yellowhammer

We also caught Goldcrest, Blackbird, Coal Tit, a total of fifty birds ringed.

Today I arrived at Dunces Corner Pond to see another swan on the pond. It was a pleasant surprise to see this was a Whooper swan, which is a new species to the reserve.

Now our recently arrived Mute swan has not been impressed by the new arrival and has spent most of the day harassing the Whooper.

At one point it became a bit brutal and the mute had the whooper penned into the reeds and was pecking feathers out of it. Hopefully things will have calmed down by tomorrow!

It’s that time of year where all sorts are popping out the woodwork, literally.

I’m no expert but I have tried to give a name to most of the ones I have seen.

One of the fields where we planted a wildlife hedge missed out on its double fence due to it having a crop in there. Now the crop has been harvested we are now looking to put the second fence in. The first job was to clear all the vegetation that has grown over the last year.

I have started this process:-

It was interesting to see the contrast between a section that had been hidden by thick vegetation and was growing well:-

The section which wasn’t quite so hidden:-

It shows how the deer grazing has stunted the growth!

So, hopefully, when we get the second fence in place this will give the hedge a better chance of growing more quickly.

We have a new arrival on our big pond:-

She appeared last Friday and seems to be a youngish female mute swan. It looks like she is used to human contact as she has taken food from my hand.

Could get a bit of a problem if Charles and Camilla decide to return soon!

Just a few pictures of various visitors to the bog over the last few days.

I had a wander down to the reserve tonight and it was an eventful trip. The deer were out in numbers with four adults and four fawns spotted. This included a mother and youngster I have not seen before :-

I also saw three badgers out for a wander including this young cub trotting around the field next to the reserve:-

I was also lucky enough to see our local barn owl cruising over the reserve (too dark for a photo). There were also a number of bats flying over the reserve.