Good Friday. Just. Only a few hours into the Easter weekend and we were rising from our bed before the sun and heading to our reed bed site to undertake another ringing session. The clear sky overhead was already getting lighter, no longer the deep black midnight sky, hinting at the sunny day to come. … More An Epic Easter Adventure
It feels like March has flown by and while last year we were in the grasp of the Beast from the East, this year the warm weather of February has continued. In March 2018 we were building snowmen, walking on squeaky snow and braving sub-zero temperatures, while the natural world seemed only to be just … More March Nests
An unseasonably warm February had brought out pockets of beautiful spring flowers, adding splashes of yellow and purple to the white clusters of snowdrops. Bees buzzed around patches of purple and white heather, and I caught glimpses of my first brimstone, comma and red admiral butterflies of the year. The sky was an impossible shade … More A river ramble
Night in the forest. Blocks of densely planted pine trees crowd in close to the track. Narrow trunks, spindly branches and prickly needles are illuminated by the white beams of the car headlights, before disappearing into dark shadows once more. Immense piles of felled trunks, still caked in snow, are stacked by the side of … More Oh W’OWL!
It had been a foul night as Storm Deidre swept into the UK. For many it brought snow and very strong winds. For us in Norfolk it was a night of wind and rain. The morning however dawned calm and bright, with a beautiful blue sky. After the nights battering the forest was soggy. Droplets … More Winter Checks
The garden was resplendent, a vibrant palette of autumn colours. The oak tree was ablaze with reds, oranges and yellows. The leaves on the shrubs, bushes and trees varying from deep greens to bright reds. Many of the smaller trees had dropped their leaves, leaving twisted dark branches except for the silver birch whose striking … More Feathers wagging
Night on a working farm is not quite completely quiet or completely dark. The surrounding fields are cloaked in darkness and the sky above is filled with stars. Across this nightscape we hear the ‘seep’ of calling redwing, returning for the winter. Tall buildings loom out of the black, their angular lines and features illuminated … More The Owl of Athena
The afternoon sun was low in a blue sky with just a few wisps of white cloud. Sunbeams slanted through the trees and bushes, turning the tops of the reeds, heavy with seeds, golden yellow. It was the last weekend in September and with the final early start at our reed bed site the following … More Pretty in Pink
We had returned to the house from a bygone era where only a few weeks ago we had been delighted with a family of barn owls. On that day, once we had finished processing and ringing the owls, we had wandered over to check a number of other bird boxes erected in the surrounding trees. … More A kestrel surprise
Minsmere: 1,000 hectares of nature reserve managed by the Royal Society for Protection of Birds. A mosaic of habitats from woodland and open grassland which gently slopes to extensive areas of rustling reed beds and marsh, opening out into pools and shallow coastal lagoons with exposed areas of mud, to a shingle beach onto which … More Minsmere
