The only stayer appears to have been an osprey - seen around site several times between Sunday and Thursday. The first true winter migrant was seen on Friday night in the form of the first pink-footed goose of the winter on D reservoir. Here the gull roost is well underway with around 25,000 common and black-headed gulls present. The barn owls have become more active in the day too - being rained off on a night - one was seen at North Marsh on the reserve walk yesterday and this indivdual was at the southern site earlier in the week:
Waders have been thin on the ground - presumably as there is so much choice with flooded fields and our marshes are struggling to lose the water. The best chance of interest has been the mixed tit flocks on site - usually a gang of long-tails as below - but the week has seen a huge fall of goldcrests on the site - nobody has found a firecrest or yellow-browed as yet - but keep trying!
The site is alive with fungi of all shapes and colours - this agaric sp. and shaggy inkcap being but two.
Once again - there a couple of places left on the October 17th fungi walk - book soon to avoid disappointment!
There are still plenty of snakes about as the weather is somewhat mild. This stumpy individual (lost it's tail tip) took me by suprise at dusk on a woodland path on thursday!
This smaller version was on one of the hay piles prior to Friday's showers:
Finally I have just totted up the BTO business bird challenge totals for the quarter - details on the page linked above.
