Well the reserve team have been quite busy this week making a slight alteration to the paths near the Double Decker hide. This was necessary as the open area led to confusion for some, causing them to be a bit lost.
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| The big machinery was called in. |
Using some of the Poplars that were cut down a few weeks ago, a barrier was put in place.
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| The poplar trunk was then covered with Breckland soil. |
By covering the logs with the soil, a unique habitat has been created for invertebrates to live in. In turn, this will benefit other wildlife that will feed off the insects within.
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| A natural barrier. |
This natural barrier will keep people on the paths and hopefully not lost. Then they can enjoy the pleasure of the reserve without a care in the world.
Help for our little friends!
As many of you may know, our hedgehogs have been in serious decline for sometime now with populations down from over 30 million in the 1950’s to just over 1 million now. This trend is not good and we must do all we can to help our spike little garden friends. They provide a valuable service in our gardens eating such pests as slug, snails and leaf beetles. However, the increase in vehicles on our roads, nice clean tidy gardens, pesticides and shiplap fencing to define the borders of our gardens, have not been favourable changes for the hedgehog.
We can do little things to help hedgehogs by reducing our use of pesticides in our gardens, leaving a small gap of a few inches under our fences and garden gates, leaving a pile of leaf little or just let the leaves accumulate a bit around your garden. If possible, you can give them a real boost by providing them a shelter for them to raise young in and/or hibernate in during winter.
An empty wooden box should suffice, along with any leaf litter you can leave lying around. The hedgehog will collect her own nesting material and drag it to the box. We have a wonderful volunteer called Bob who makes hedgehog boxes for the Trust with all proceeds going towards the Trust and these are sold at Lackford with instructions for only £25.
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| Hedgehog nesting boxes for sale at Lackford. |
They do have a tendency to sell quickly, so make sure you get yours and give Suffolk’s hedgehogs (and your garden) a helping hand.
Your photos!
Many of you have been answering the call to share your photos and wow, what a talented bunch you are, keep them coming.
The Red Crested Pochard is still visible from the Fullers Mill Hide and was captured by Joe Jackson who sent his photo in via email: lackford.centre@suffolkwildlifetrust.org (put ‘For the blog’ in the subject line).
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| Red Crested Pochard © Joe Jackson |
Joe also managed to find a spot where the Nuthatch’s are nesting and grabbed these wonderful shots as they flew to and from the nest.
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| © Joe Jackson |
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| © Joe Jackson |
Chiffchaff’s are in full swing with their song now at Lackford and are often seen from time to time too.
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| Chiffchaff © Joe Jackson |
The Great Crested Grebe’s have been displaying down at Atlas hide and we’ve been getting some great photos sent in. Jon Winnan sent us these:
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| Having a break © Jon Winnan |
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| Close up © Jon Winnan |
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| A member of the visitor team caught this shot in mid display. |
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| © Greg Veness |
Jon also caught this Snipe showing it’s plumage off.
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| © Jon Winnan |
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| © Jon Winnan |
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| © Barry Woodhouse |
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| © Barry Woodhouse |
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| © Barry Woodhouse |
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| © Barry Woodhouse |
We would like to thank all of you for your images and please keep them coming. If you have any images that you have taken at Lackford that you want to share with us, then email us with the words ‘For the blog’ in the subject line and we will do our best to feature them.
Sightings
Not 1, not 2, but 3 Sand Martin’s have been spotted over the sailing lake this week, a sure sign that the weather is improving. A female Marsh Harrier was seen flying past the visitor centre too.
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| Female Marsh Harrier. |
Our yearly total is now up to 102 today thanks to a Common Crane seen flying south over the reserve. Peregrine, Red Kite’s and Buzzard’s have also been spotted flying over too!
Red Crested Pochard as mentioned above at Fuller Mil hide, Cettis Warbler can be heard from the path along the sailing lake where Goldeneye can be seen bobbing around. The Kingfisher is still showing up at the visitor centre pond from time to time and Chiffchaff’s can be heard and seen at various points around the reserve. Siskin, Coal tit, Marsh tit & Nuthatch have all been showing well down at Ash Carr. Here’s photo one of our staff managed to get lately.
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| Nuthatch © Hawk Honey |
Snipe have been seen down at Steggall’s and Bill’s hide on the Slough. Also spotted on the Slough have been Shelduck, Heron’s, Redshank and Teal.
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| Redshank seen from Bill’s hide. |
Don’t forget to pop into the centre when you arrive to find out what’s happening, the staff are very friendly and don’t bite. Also let us know what you’ve seen regardless of how common or unimportant you think it is. We often get novice birders visiting the centre and people from abroad on holiday who have not seen birds we think are quite common.
Also, if you use Twitter, do pop in and say hello, it’s good to put a face to a Tweet from time to time.
Hope you all have a good week, see you next time.
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