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Forgive the lack of updates on the blog of recent times. This is mostly due to late July and August being amongst our busiest times of the year. With hundreds of visitors coming out to the island and continuing with the reserve work including the benthic sampling (seeing what insects live in the mud...

As the breeding season begins to enter the final furlong, it’s time for an update on this troubled breeding season. Unfortunately, there is rather more bad news than good news. Starting with the bad news. Common gulls are having a disastrous year, for the first time in two years the...

After 5 months, the earthwork and engineering work on Havergate is complete. Now after the changes, comes the hard part, namely using the new sluices and island layout to increase the ecological effectiveness of the reserve. It will be worth keeping an eye on both the RSPB website and the Alde –...

Whilst the island is still shut to the general public bird life on Havergate has continued. Highlights so far include wintering spoonbills, shorelarks and short eared owls. Its interesting how spoonbill wintering ecology in Suffolk is beginning to change and especially in the Alde- Ore estuary. ...

Late March has seen the island begin to don its breeding season cloak. Big numbers of gulls have arrived at the last Webs count 624 Lesser Black backs had returned to the lagoons and 518 Herring gulls. This count doesn’t include the salt marshes or the long shingle bank at an estimate...

If visitor trips where football or cricket teams then the trips out to Havergate would be described as being in a bad run of form! The last three trips have all had to be cancelled due to a combination of factors. The December visit due to snow, ice and freezing conditions and the January and February...

Otters once a near mythical sighting has become increasingly common in the last few years, in fact I heard someone recently describe them as “ubiquitous”. The island is a classic example of this before August 2010 the total number of sightings on Havergate sat at zero. Admittedly, there...

Of late the blog seems to have been dominated by articles on “issues”. As a change I thought it would be nice to update people about what has been going on, on the island. Every day seems to bring a good species to the island and the island is jumping with birds. Most lagoons are full...

Earlier in the season we had the disappointment of the Avocets being predated. However, this week’s blog entry should go some way to alleviating this sense of disappointment. This week I get the rare pleasure of reporting, not just one bit of good news but two bits of positive news. Those who...

I’ll keep this brief but sad news..... The Flamingo has departed the islands. No more will anyone look across Main lagoon and be cheered by sight of a large pink bird, normally with his head in the water, feeding away, no more will he take off in flight and look like a long thin pink pencil with...

The breeding season continues a pace on the island. However, firstly I must break some bad news. In my last blog piece I reported that the island was playing host to 23 Avocets the highest breeding number in some time, however between the dates 14 th to the 16 th of July all the nests where predated...