End of the season at Weeting Heath

Matt Twydell, Weeting Heath Summer Warden
 
It is now the end of the season here at NWT Weeting Heath and unfortunately the end of my summer contract here, I have enjoyed my time here at Weeting Heath and the season has flown by. The dropping temperatures and leaves are the starting signs of autumn and winter, other signs on the reserve are the appearance of several fungi that have been sprouting up at Weeting. 

This year has been a good year for the main attraction at Weeting Heath, the stone curlew. Five pairs nested on Weeting Heath this year producing five chicks that fledged from in front of the hides which is the highest for several years.

Three of the fledged chicks came from one pair which managed to have two broods this year. This pair consists of an unringed female and a ringed male which we call Upper Right Black, due to the ring combination including a black ring on its upper right leg (original name I know!). The ringing of stone curlews is part of the Stone Curlew Recovery Project and has been going since the 80s, it gives us an insight and important data into where the stone curlews breed, potential survival rates and where they overwinter from year to year.

 
What makes Upper Right Black interesting is that we have been told potentially this bird was first ringed as a chick in 1990! Making this bird the oldest recorded bird in the project at an age of 23! This bird was part of a pair which successfully reared and fledged three chicks this year. Below is a video I took on my phone earlier in the season showing Upper Right Black with two of its chicks and on the right a close up picture of one of his chicks we ringed this year, lets hope his chick will make it to 23 as well and be back at Weeting Heath in 2037!

Stone curlews normally depart at the end of September or start of October to overwinter in southern Spain or northern Africa such as Morocco (something I know I would like to do). There has been one or two records of stone curlews overwintering in this country when whether conditions are mild enough. So potentially if Upper Right Black has been flying to southern Spain for the last 23 years, it means he has flown roughly a staggering 55,000 miles in its life time, which is twice the circumference of the Earth at the equator!

Other interesting wildlife seen this year include two cranes flying over the reserve in June, which means that 95 species of bird were recorded at Weeting Heath this year. A clouded yellow butterfly was also recorded on the reserve which brought the total number of species for this year to 24. Bats were also recorded for the first time this year at Weeting Heath through the free Norfolk Bat Survey, which anyone can take part in. The results showed that at least eight species of bat use the reserve including brown long-eared, noctule and 
Daubenton's.


Spiked speedwell flowered early this year at the end of June rather than July and August due to the warm weather, with over 550 flowering plants counted.

So the season has now ended and the reserve is now all shut until next March, hopefully you will come visit next year where you might get to see old Upper Right Black celebrating his 24th year.

Cheers

Excavation completed at Potter reedbed creation site

Nick Carter, Conservation Officer (Fens)

William Morfoot Ltd has completed the excavation works at Potter in just over five weeks. They have created a number of deep pools connecting to the ditch network to enable fish to move around the site and to act as refuges. The scale of the works can be seen from the aerial photo taken by Morfoot’s drone:

Photo supplied by William Morfoot Ltd

 

Following on behind them, Broadwood has planted over 35,000 reeds, grown by local nurseries British Wild Flower Plants using seed harvested from reeds at Hickling. These reeds have mostly been planted along the edges of the newly created deep pools. This reed/water edge is critical to attract bitterns to the site as it is along these edges that the birds primarily feed.

Over the winter the ditch from NWT Hickling Broad to the site will be enhanced to enable water levels to be raised which will aid the survival and spread of the reeds. A decision will be taken early next year about further reed planting. Then all we have to do is sit back and wait for the bitterns and marsh harriers to arrive!

October species of the month: fungi

Ed Parnell, Norfolk Wildlife Trust 

One of the great pleasures of autumn is to walk through the woods, breathing in the distinctive, slightly sweet odour of rotten wood and fallen leaves. On dead trees, around the base of stumps, and in grassy clearings, fungi will also be much in evidence but knowing which species you’re looking at is not always easy. That’s no surprise when you consider that over 10,000 fungi species have been recorded in Britain – with around 3,500 of those found in Norfolk.

Perhaps the best way to get an introduction to this mycological world is to join a fungus foray. A number of such walks are held around the county each autumn, run by Norfolk Wildlife Trust local groups, the National Trust or the Norfolk and Norwich Naturalists' Society. It’s essential to know what you’re doing where fungi are concerned, particularly if you are picking mushrooms to eat, as there are a number of poisonous species, some of which are potentially deadly. If in any doubt whatsoever stick to the mushrooms in your local supermarket!

Death Cap, photo by Tony Leech

The most common of the deadly species in the UK is the deathcap. Although this yellowish species looks rather innocuous and undistinguished its effects are anything but, with fatal kidney and liver failure resulting a couple of days after ingestion. Similar symptoms are produced by the equally emotively named destroying angel. Another to avoid is the panthercap, which at least is easier to recognise – it has a rather lethal look about it with cream spots splattered across its brown cap.

Perhaps the most distinctive poisonous species to watch out for is the fly agaric. With its bright scarlet cap, covered with white, wart-like specks, this is the archetypal fairytale toadstool. In addition to causing convulsions and a catatonic sleep it’s also strongly hallucinogenic – a property utilised by shamans of the Sami people of Lapland, as well as their reindeer, which seem to experience a similar mind-altered state when consuming these magical mushrooms. Indeed, many reindeer apparently become rather partial to the sensation, actively seeking out the toadstools when they get the chance. In Norfolk, you won’t see any reindeers behaving badly, but a good place to search for fly agarics is NWT Roydon Common, near King’s Lynn, as the site’s mixture of heathland and birch woods is ideal for this red and white gem. 

Fly agaric, photo by Peter Dent

Other interesting species found in Norfolk include: giant puffballs, which can grow up to 80cm across; King Alfred’s Cakes (ironically inedible) – small, hard rounded balls which grow on dead trees and can be seen at NWT Lower Wood, Ashwellthorpe; Chicken of the woods which, as its name suggests, tastes (apparently!) like chicken; the stinkhorn, which is often detected by its unpleasant, putrid odour, and which also has a rudely distinctive appearance – NWT Foxley Wood, just off the A1067 Norwich–Fakenham road is a good place to look for this species, as well as being generally good for all autumn fungi.

For details of Norfolk Wildlife Trust events see www.norfolkwildlifetrust.org.uk/whats on

Living Landscape activities: now every week

Mark Webster, Living Landscape project officer

Norfolk Wildlife Trust staff are breaking out of their Roydon Common nature reserve to help local communities to create a ‘Living Landscape’ in and around King's Lynn.  Focusing on the Gaywood River and its surrounding Valley, NWT’s Gemma Walker and I will be running activities at the same time every week from October onwards, based at Reffley Community Centre on Reffley Lane. 

Volunteering, photo by Tony McKie

Kicking things off at 10am on Monday 6 October will be a Fungi Foray with expert (and enthusiast) Dr Tony Leech, who will lead us out from Reffley Community Centre car park round the nearby woods, searching for and identifying as many mushrooms as possible. 

From then on, the group will be meeting every Monday morning at 10am (with a short break for Christmas and New Year) always starting at Reffley Community Hall car park, Reffley Lane, Kings Lynn, PE30 3EQ, at 10am. Activities in October and November include visits to ‘hidden gem’ wildlife sites in the area  (a minibus is provided if it’s too far to walk), work to improve local woodland habitats, and the chance to learn more about the Gaywood River and the history of Kings Lynn.

Sessions generally last until 1pm but you can leave earlier if you need to. Most sessions will include the chance to try practical conservation work and/or learning about wildlife, but you do NOT have to be physically fit to take part. Tea and biscuits are usually provided, as are any tools equipment and training needed. 

Anyone can just turn up and join in (under 18s need to be accompanied by an adult) and all you need to bring are old outdoor working clothes. There’s usually no need to book but Gemma and Mark are happy to answer any questions you may have before you give it a try: call 01603 598333 or email wild@norfolkwildlifetrust.org.uk. You can also find out more about the new Living Landscape approach at www.mylivinglandscape.org.uk

A gem of an emerald

Chris Durdin, NWT Thorpe Marshes
Is nature predictable or unpredictable? Discuss, as exam questions used to say. A recent discovery at NWT Thorpe Marshes was, you might say, a predictable surprise… so perhaps the best of both.

That discovery was a new damselfly for the reserve on the edge of Norwich. Willow Emerald is name of the species, or Western Willow Spreadwing in the European field guide. ‘Spreadwing’ is from the position at rest of this and related species, as the photo shows. This damselfly perched on a sallow twig, a typical pose.

Willow Emerald Damselfly Chalcolestes viridis

The Willow Emerald is a recent UK colonist, first found in Suffolk in 2007. It’s now fairly widespread in the right habitats in our neighbouring county, and spreading. It's been at RSPB Strumpshaw Fen for a few years, and was seen well on the River Yare at Cringleford in 2013. As NWT Thorpe Marshes is midway between Strumpshaw and Cringleford, I mentioned Willow Emerald on my September guided walk as a damselfly to lookout for.  Hey presto … one of that group returned and found it. I hear they’ve also been found in several other places this year.

It took me three attempts to see the Willow Emerald for myself, but warm autumn days meant there were many dragonflies on the wing to keep me company. And, on one visit, a whinchat, too: an autumn migrant, so when you might expect to see it, but far from predictable.

Incidentally, the Willow Emerald brings the reserve Odonata list to 19. That’s slightly fewer than Strumpshaw Fen's 24 (22 breeding species, 2 vagrants). Do any blog readers know how other Norfolk sites compare? In another role, as a soccer coach, I know I must keep the lid on the ‘competitive dad’, but I can’t help but wonder how my local patch ranks against more famous nature reserves.

Would anyone like to predict what we’ll find next at NWT Thorpe Marshes?

More wildlife news and details of monthly walks on http://www.honeyguide.co.uk/thorpemarshes.htm

Storm Surge: wildlife on the edge

David North, Head of People and Wildlife

   
The night of 5 December 2013 was memorable – at least for those who live and work on our Norfolk coast. 
 

Photo by Richard Porter

The biggest storm surge since 1953: a night that brought flooding and damage to homes and businesses on parts of the North Norfolk coast. But at least, unlike 1953, there was good advance warning. But think again. There were some who make their homes on this coast who had no warning of the great flood to come that night. These were the wild mammals and birds who spend the winter on these coastal marshes. The myriads of tiny creatures which depend on freshwater habitats on our wonderful nature reserves at Cley Marshes, Blakeney Point and Salthouse Marshes.


Related blog post: CEO Brendan Joyce visits the site the morning after the night before. 
 
I remember the weekend after the storm surge walking from Salthouse village to Cley and back again and looking in awe and wonder at a landscape transformed. The usually busy main coast road transformed into a medieval looking footpath covered in parts with a debris of reed and mud waist high. It was extraordinary : odd bits of wood washed off the marshes, plastic boxes from the fishing industry, planks with nails in, all jumbled together. The familiar landscape of marsh and reedbed I know and love transformed into a vast expanse of water. The distant shingle ridge almost invisible, with huge waves still battering and overtopping the shingle in many places.

The silence of walking a usually busy road with no passing cars was striking. Just the calls of thousands of gulls feeding on earthworms killed by the salt water and brent geese bobbing on water where usually they would be busy grazing on marsh. No warning for the wildlife. What could possibly survive?

For me the memory of this post-storm surge walk, my awe at the sheer power of nature to transform in a single night the familiar into a territory strange and unknown, will live with me a life time.

The National Trust rangers inspect the damage to the Blakeney Freshes, photo by Richard Porter

For those who didn’t experience the storm surge so personally (and indeed for those who did!) Norfolk Wildlife Trust, in a partnership with the Forum Trust, have put together photos and video of the impact of this one December night on the well-known and much loved nature reserves of Blakeney Point, Cley and Salthouse. Come along see what happened on that night and how the next morning the coastal landscape was changed beyond recognition. Hear about the work of National Trust and Norfolk Wildlife Trust to repair and restore these nature reserves: rebuilding pathways, repairing hides, replacing bridges and enabling visitors to once again enjoy these special places.

 

Grey seals in the innundated Lifeboat Station garden, photo by Richard Porter

But most important of all, what of the wildlife that makes these places so vital and important? This is a story of the amazing powers of nature to recover. The resilience of species to survive. The grey seals on Blakeney Point are testament to this. The storm surge hit at the worst possible time, the height of the breeding season with young seal pubs unweaned, and completely dependent on their mother’s milk. Wardens feared the worst. Surely most of these seals, just weeks old, would have been washed far away and separated from their mothers. Amazingly last winter was the most successful breeding season for grey seals in the history of this nature reserve. To me this remains almost incredible. Did the seals with some sense unknown to us mere humans somehow know to move their pups to the highest part of Blakeney’s dunes before the storm surge hit? Whatever the reason nearly all the pups survived.

As you will see in the Fusion show nature is resilient. If you visit the shingle ridge at Cley Marshes today you will see this process of recovery; yellow-horned poppies already colonising areas of raw shingle pushed inland by the surge. New life flowering in an evolving landscape. Come along to Fusion in the Forum. It’s free admission and open every day from Monday 1 September until Saturday 6 Saturday from 10am to 4pm and see for yourself the beauty and power of nature at these ever-changing but always wonderful nature reserves. See how Norfolk Wildlife Trust and National Trust continue to keep these places special for our wildlife and special for visitors to enjoy.

Bartsia, mint and a combing bee

Chris Durdin, NWT Thorpe Marshes

Many of the late summer flowers of NWT Thorpe Marshes are pink and purple, such as hemp agrimony, purple loosestrife and marsh woundwort. Those three are big and showy, but the pictures here show two similarly coloured but smaller species.
 

Red bartsia

Red bartsia is a real oddity – a plant of bare ground, rather than marshes. Here it grows on the edge of the path and is far from showy: overlooked rather than scarce. It’s semi-parasitic, gaining extra nutrients by tapping into the roots of grasses.

Water mint is better known, and as the name suggests grows in ditches or on their edges. Squeeze a leaf, sniff and it’s obviously a mint. The flowers are in pretty, round heads, and this one has attracted a common carder bee.

Many bee species are horribly similar but the red-brown back and stripy tail end makes this fairly distinctive. Why ‘carder’ bee? Carding is the process of combing and cleaning fibres, such as prior to spinning wool, or raising the nap of woven wool. Apparently the bees use combs on their legs to do this to moss and grass for their nests, though I can’t claim to have witnessed the process.

Water mint with common carder bee

As an aside, the word carding is sometimes said to derive from Carduus for the teasels once used to comb wool. This at first pleasing etymological nugget rather falls apart as Carduus is actually a genus of thistle – teasels are Dipsacus. Teasel heads mounted on a stiff, flat structure make a card for carding, which is some way removed from the stiff paper we call card.

More wildlife news and details of monthly walks on www.honeyguide.co.uk/thorpemarshes

Wetland creation sites are just like buses

 Nick Carter, Conservation Officer (Fens)

You wait ages for one to come along and then two arrive at the same time! Construction works at the two new reed beds at Hilgay and Potter Heigham are now finished. The abstraction system at Hilgay, from the River Wissey, was finally installed, tested and shown to be leak-free. At the Potter site the water control structures to allow water from Hickling Broad onto the site was installed.

Although these important milestones have been reached the work is only really just starting. Diggers from William Morfoot Ltd are on site at Potter to create pools to act as fish refuges and feeding sites for the bitterns that will hopefully take up residence on the site. These will closely be followed by reed planters coming in to plant up the edges of these pools and to re-stock some of the caged areas that were planted last year but where the reed plugs did not grow.  

At Hilgay the site will be wetted up over the winter to encourage survival of the reeds that were planted last year and to aid their spread across the site. It will take several years however for the site to be completely filled with water and even longer for the reed beds to develop.

Bulldozer stripping the top soil at Methwold

Next door to the Hilgay site construction work has just started on the Methwold site with Fen Group’s bulldozer working to strip top soil prior to the excavation of new ditches and the construction of the perimeter bund. Work will stop at the end of the autumn to preserve the soil structure and it is hoped that all the work will be completed by next summer. This will allow reed planting to be carried out prior to the site being wetted up, with the water coming from Hilgay.