Better than Africa

Well an exciting week at the reserve this week, especially with the opening of our new hide at Steggall's. The hide was funded by Paul Holness and Val Wallace and was designed by  our volunteer and trustee James Robinson. It was all built by our reserves team volunteers and wood turner Mike Harding added a beautiful acorn to adorn the top.

Wood turned Acorn by Mike Harding tops the new hide.

The new Steggall's hide is about 1km from the centre and is octagonal in shape and is named after Peter Steggall, a champion of the reserve in the 1980's, who with Bernard Tickner, gifted the reserve to the Trust. It is situated in between Plover Lake and Wilson's Flood and its shape gives it an all round view of both lakes. It's been constructed from sustainable timber and because it was built by our wonderful volunteers, we managed to construct it for a sixth of the price! This in itself, just goes to show just how valuable our volunteers are.

Paul and Val officially open the new hide.

The weather was unseasonably warm, around 12ºC and dry thankfully, so the turn out was good.

Volunteers and onlookers turned out to see the opening.

Volunteers of the reserves team along will Giles Cawston and Will Cranstoun 

Well done to all who were involved with the project, your work is greatly appreciated not only by the Trust, but by all those who visit our reserve too. Great job!

Better than Africa?

Well, there's been some new sightings on the reserve this week along with the usual suspects of Goosander, Goldeneye, Pintail, Kingfisher and over 290 Teal on the Slough. There's also been a sighting of a family of otters around Bess' and Atlas hide around 3pm and a suspected sighting of Bittern to the NE of the Double-decker hide. We haven't had any other sightings of it yet, but watch this space and we'll keep you posted! 

Last evening (19th Dec) a House Martin was spotted by birder Nick Moran and those gathered to watch the Starling murmuration. This is most unusual, as the last recorded House Martin in the UK (according to Birdtrack) is the 3rd December. It is unlikely that this bird will now complete its journey to Africa, where it should be by now. So it looks like it might see it's Xmas in colder climes.

Female Goldeneye by Ian Goodall

 

Goosanders on the Slough by Ian Goodall

Xmas opening

Just a reminder that the visitor centre will be closed from Christmas Eve right through to the 31st December and this will be the last blog post of 2014. We've had a wonderful year here at Lackford with some exciting times and we have even more exciting times ahead for us in 2015. Everyone here at Lackford would like to thank all our visitors and members and wish them and their families a Happy Christmas and a Happy New Year! See you in 2015.