Latest sightings
The Marsh Harriers at Martin Mere today have been putting on a show with up to 9 seen at once. They are still roosting next to the Harrier Hide and flying out around 10am hunting over the reedbed woodend marsh and the wet grassland fields.
We still have good numbers of pink-footed geese on site, unfortunately as we are now in Tier 3 we have cancelled our evening geese events but the geese are on site most of the day, the best place to see them is on Plover field which can be seen from the United Utilities hide.
The duck numbers are increasing and there are huge flocks on the mere, including 1000 teal, 400 pintail, 400 wigeon, 130 Shelduck and 140 Shoveler. The ruff are increasing too with 35 on the mere feeding around the edges. Stock photo pintail.
The Whooper swans have arrived on mass with 299 at our last dawn count and a further 500 roosting on the Ribble estuary. Some familiar faces have arrived including KSL who was originally ringed as an adult female in Iceland in 1999, she's at least 23 years old (older than all of the reserve placement students this year). While we are in Tier 3 we will not be doing commentated swan feeds but we are still feeding the swans twice a day.
Stonechats have been seen around the reserve on the fence posts from the gordon Taylor hide. The grey wagtails are showing well in the reedbed and by the duckery. Cetti's warbler and water rail are calling lots in the reedbed.
