Hello - and a belated Happy New Year to all readers of the Saltholme blog.
We are expecting a very hectic year ahead of us here in the Tees Valley, as all those long-held plans for this exciting project continue to come together.
We were delighted to welcome two new faces to the Saltholme team at the start of the New Year. Lisa Daley joins us from her current role managing the visitor centre at Albert Park in Middlesbrough. Lisa will be running the new Saltholme Visitor Centre - once it's built - and is busy planning the visitor side of things. Emma Birnie is the new Saltholme reserve warden and joins us from the RSPB's Leighton Moss reserve. Lisa and Emma are currently based in a portacabin at the offices of our neighbours Sabic UK while our new buildings on the main Saltholme site are under construction.
There were new arrivals on the wildlife front too this month. The start of the year brought some good birds to Saltholme. In early January there was a male scaup on the pools. The scaup is a rare duck on inland lakes spending most of the winter months in coastal waters. They are a northern breeder, with most birds breeding in the Arctic Circle, Iceland and Norway. The largest UK concentrations are found in winter off the west coast so the bird at Saltholme was particularly noteworthy.
Members of the Teesmouth Bird Club came on a special `behind the scenes' visit to see progress at Saltholme on Sunday 20th January. Conditions were wet and muddy but that did not dampen their enthusiasm for the project. They looked at Saltholme's Discovery Centre which is now taking shape with all of the steel work skeleton in place. They then went on to see the Saltholme Pools Hide, which is now almost fully completed. They also took a look at the locations of the Paddy`s Pool Hide and the Family Hide which are awaiting their steel work before construction gets underway.
The group was treated to plenty of birds during the trip, including little egret, peregrine falcon, 2000 golden plovers, 2500 lapwings and large flocks of wildfowl. Some of the ducks clearly think that Spring is just around the corner and were already displaying. Two drake goldeneyes put on a particularly entertaining show as they displayed with their classic `head throwing` at a female...who remained totally disinterested by their advances!
The Saltholme Team