Lapwings pairs nesting
Lapwings on eggs, mallard duckling hatching and lots of insect activity.
Bee flies are about - don't worry, they don't sting.
Spring is underway and here's the highlights from the wild side of Arundel last week:
- Butterflies out again last week: peacocks and brimstones
- Beeflies hatched out
- Hairy-footed flower bee males buzzing around nest of females in walls of Sand Martin hide
- Water vole sighting in the ditch beside Ramsar hide on Sunday
- Kingfisher on Wetlands Discovery on Sunday afternoon, pair a likely nesting offsite now
- 4-5 lapwing on sitting on eggs, at least 7 pairs of Lapwing onsite
- Brown long-eared bats roosting in the Sand Martin Hide – active and awake.
- Three pairs of shovelers on wet grassland, 2 at Scrape hide
- First clutch of mallard duckling spotted on Sunday on Long path ditch
- First grass snake of season spotted sunny along path to willow arbour from Lapwing hide.
- Lots of gulls have moved on but there are still some Mediterranean gulls around, the black-headed gulls on Arun Rverlife lagoon will be staying to nest.
- Spring singing from Cetti’s warbler, black caps and chiffchaffs
- Great-spotted woodpecker drumming in Woodland Loop
- Gull were mobbing a juvenile heron fishing between Ramsar and Sand Martin hides on Sunday
- Still a dozen snipe visible near Ramsar hide with many more in likely hiding
