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May blossom and gorse in bloom - Campfield Marsh. Spring was late this year – universally accepted, we think. We might add that here at Campfield, we are used to late Springs! We swear to you folks that the Ash trees at the top end of the Lonning only started to come into leaf 10 days ago! ...

Lapwing fledglings after the storm. There had been 24 hours of really quite heavy rain. This was not good news at this time of the year as we knew Lapwing had been breeding in the wet meadows along the Lonning and Snipe in the wetter areas of the Reserve. Let's face it – their nests are...

Campfield Marsh. Now we come to the 3rd part of the Blog, having dealt with accommodation issues. We can start to describe the main features of the area which is after all what you will be coming to enjoy, be it Spring, Summer or Winter. In the case of birders, winter in the Solway area is of particular...

Campfield Marsh - early April. 6th April 2013 Sunny all day with a light SW wind. Early morning there were 14 Shelduck with two Mallard pairs out on the mudflats. A small group of Redshank came in with the tide. On the Meadow Pools, Wigeon and Teal were gathering and seemingly pairing up. The two...

This Spring and early Summer have been a real mixed bag - especially this last week! One minute, glorious sunshine and the next torrential rain and bitter winds. One hardly knows what to do! Have turned into a softie really - should have taken it easier on the cupcakes, blue icing and party sized Eton...

The short answer to that is, “Yes” - so don’t expect any more bardic utterances from me! Evening view across the wetlands from the raised bower. Although it is still Spring, here on the Campfield wetlands, today it felt like the middle of June: the wind had dropped and the...

Criffel and the Solway after the Storm, 17th October. 15th October A very warm misty morning with a rosy dawn. Small parties Barnacles could be seen and heard flying west most of the morning. Lots of Gulls out on the channel with a single Whooper on the tideline. Small party of Barnacles...

Barnacles are a speciality of the Solway. This group were on the Cardurnock pastures. Oystercatchers battling with the tail-end of Hurricane Katia. A typical Solway farm here on Campfield Marsh Summer Solway and Criffel from Campfield Marsh. Barnacles on the saltings of the R...

Skein of Pinks at sunset 1st October Weather is still warm and sunny. Speckled Woods seen mating today and a flock of about 80 Pinks flew in from the across the saltmarsh and headed off in a south-easterly direction. Speckled Woods mating. Female (the larger one) seems to have laid an egg...

18th - 31st AUGUST Looking inland across the 'sands' towards Campfield Marsh 18th August Cold wind from the west today. Wader numbers are starting to build up: predominently Oystercatcher with small numbers of Grey Plover, Black-tailed Godwit and Dunlin. Whimbrel could be heard calling...

Haymaking by the Old Broken Willow. We had managed to provoke the Weather Gods into giving us an Indian Summer - ten days of glorious dry sunny weather. I said to Judith, "the farmers had better get going and get all that hay in - it’s more than ready and dry as tinder." There are...

"Oh to be at 'Campfield' now that April's here" - a pastel-style digital painting by John Rogers Already the mighty pendulum, that governs all life on this planet, is well on its way. The Vernal Equinox is nearly a month past but the bird world would have been stirring even before...

They call it ‘climate change’. They always have to have a nice neat title for things these days: everything pigeonholed and computerised. It’s an industry now. Universities have whole departments on the subject; people are making careers from it. In the ‘old days’ we...

…sort of a day. It was warm, when the sun came out it was really hot – but across the estuary big black clouds were looming. No wind. So we set out for the Reserve, ready for anything! The Common Hawker was our first encounter as we walked down the track passed the farm. We were buzzed...

The morning dawned perfect... wall to wall sunshine - no wind! We don't often get this sort of weather on the Solway. We decided to walk down the lonning to the the flooded meadows at the end, taking the digiscope, tripod and all with us - but got no further than the first pool on the right. We were...