Well its that time of the year when something new arrives on the reserve every few days. Below are some pics of those that have arrived over the last week or so.

We also have both pairs of Swans and Canada Geese sitting on eggs, so fingers crossed.

It looks like our resident Doe is pregnant again, so fingers crossed we will have the pitter patter of tiny hooves!

Its about this time of year that she parts company with (or more accurately spends a lot less time with) her youngsters from last year. I have picked them all up on my trail cameras so here are a couple of short clips of ‘the family’.

I also have a clip of a very handsome mature buck, maybe daddy!

Thomas and Josh, have done a fab job converting a kids toy house into a multi occupancy bird house. Lets hope the tree sparrows appreciate all the work that went into the conversion!

The house has six separate rooms accessed via the windows around the house, lets hope they can find the way in.

This beautiful bird was caught during our recent bird ringing session, this is a Snipe of which we have several resident on site at the moment. A very secretive bird which is, although not uncommon, is not seen very often.

Unfortunately we also discovered a dead Woodcock in the reedbed, no signs of trauma so not sure what the cause of death was. Another magnificent bird with stunning plumage.

A very big thank you to all my helpers that came together last weekend to plant over 400 trees and hedging plants kindly donated by the woodland Trust.

We planted hedging along the boundary of the farm road, with dog rose, dogwood, hawthorn, hazel and elder.

We replaced some of the Ash trees that have been lost due to Ash die back with Silver Birch, Oak and Rowan.

On the new extension of the reserve we have planted goat willow, downy birch and oak. We have also planted an avenue of crab apple and cherry along the perimeter of the proposed new path. This will provide a corridor for birds to cross what was an open meadow.

So once again thanks to Libby, Fiona, Jack, Steve, Rose, Dom, Matthew, Aileen, Ronan , Toby, Linda, Jamie, Sammi, Angus, Ian and Louise.

Its been a very busy week on the reserve with nearly 100 of Collingwood Schools students visiting. I had a request to help with the nature part of the forest school curriculum.

Thanks to Gavin and Rebecca, the teachers, and various teaching assistants who kept the youngsters under control , almost ;0)

Feeding the swans/ducks and plodging in the mud seemed to be the favourite activities, not sure that’s on the curriculum but why not!

Its sometimes surprising what you see on the way to the hides. I was not expecting to see a Stoat clambering through the trees. Very accomplished climbers I believe, not great news for the upcoming nesting season!!

A swan update, both of our swans are sporting rings on their left legs. With the numbers I was able to send them off to my birding experts and many thanks to Andy Rickeard (Northumberland Ringing Group) who sent the following information about our swan pair.

The male was ringed, as a cygnet, at Annisford Pond on 30/7/2017 and the female was ringed as a 2nd year bird at QE2 Park Ashington in 21/3/2019. The last couple of years the pair have been hanging around the pond at Hepscott so only a short flight to Clarks Bog.

Latest development today was the arrival of a young swan, not sure if it belongs to our pair but they keep chasing it off the water. No ring so we will probably never know.

Just an update on our pair of swans, they are still with us and have started to mate and appear to be preparing a nesting site on the island. They have been named as Charles and Camilla (thanks to Dougie for the suggestion ;0)

They now are waiting for me each morning demanding their breakfast. Lets hope they reward me with a few signets this Spring.

I had some new visitors and an old one for lunch on Sunday :-

They only stayed for one night but beautiful to see and quite friendly too.

My other dinner guest has made previous appearances and appears to be not for one night only, looks like a regular!!

I had a visit from John McGuiness and his friend Larry last week and he kindly sent me some of the excellent pictures he took when in Deer View Hide. He has kindly given me permission to publish them on the blog so here is a selection.