It was a cold winter’s morning that greeted me as I left the warmth of my car in the visitor’s car park and made my way to the visitor’s centre.  The temperature gauge was reading -1C at 9.15am, the coldest day of winter so far. I popped in to the Visitors Centre to exchange pleasantries to the reserve staff and volunteers and had a cup of coffee whilst I scanned the sightings book, reports of a Bittern and Bearded Tits being on the reserve made for some good reading. I headed back out into the cold morning air, the frost making some amazing patterns on the plants and bushes alongside the ‘Discovery Trail’. I continued my walk to the Pickup Hide, lots of young Robins seemed everywhere, several were savaging for morsels of food on the floor whilst others were busily flitting from one tree to another in search of a quick snack. On arrival at the hide, all looked quiet, the area in front was quite calm, just a couple of pairs of Mallard and the odd Moorhen and Coot, no waders as such, I finished my coffee and headed further along the trail to the Kingfisher Screen. As I arrived I must have disturbed a Grey Heron which flew off downstream towards the ‘Cut Hide’, but after several minutes it returned and settled down just behind the sluice gate. Looking at the water as it flowed under the bridge where I was standing the stream was teeming with young fish, shoals of them, their silvery bodies flashing as they swam towards the sluice and the waiting Heron.  Shortly after the Heron arrived a Little Egret arrived and after an initial confrontation between the two the Egret settled down on the left hand bank a safe distance away from the Heron which was in the water. A family of Mallards swam up stream closely followed by another Little Egret which flew up to the sluice gate, narrowly missing the Heron, although it did try to dive bomb it as it came in to land on the right hand side of the stream. The Heron was having none of it and quickly scattered the family of five Mallards back down stream before setting about the newly arrived Little Egret on the right. The Grey Heron continued to fish and guard the sluice for another thirty minutes or so, within that time the first Little Egret was quietly content preening itself on the left hand bank, either that or petrified that if it moved closer to the water it would be set upon by the bigger Grey Heron! After an hour at the screen the cold was beginning to work its way up from my feet, so I packed up the camera gear and headed back to the ‘Pick up Hide’. A pair of female Pheasants where busily hoovering up under the feeders to the right of the hide, I could hear lots of Long Tailed Tits chirping away behind me in the bushes and within a few seconds they came on mass to the feeders, six of them flitting in and out, they get a bill full of food and fly back to the safety of the bushes to eat it whereas the Tree Sparrow, Chaffinch and Tits all seem quite content to sit at the feeders and eat on the job so to speak. Dunnock, Willow Tit and Robin all took their turn at the feeders all scattering though when the Grey Squirrels, two of them this morning decide to have a feed from the same feeders.

As lunch time approached so did more and more visitors so I packed the camera gear away and headed back to the warmth of the visitors centre and another coffee before I headed off for home.

A great morning at the reserve, hopefully I can arrange another visit for later in the week.