Well I've been lucky enough to have spent the last two days touring various groups round both Arne and Radipole in glorius sunshine and what a mad mix of species there was on show!

I have to start off with the big brown noisy bird in the Radipole reeds - the Great Reed Warbler. For those of you like me, who knows very little about rare birds this chap is basically a regular reed warbler that has swallowed growth hormones. It is very big (blackbird sized) very noisy and to be honest it looks too big to be able to cling on a reed without it buckling. Rather convieniently the two best places to spot it from was the new semi circular boardwalk or the new jetty (I knew those new bits and bobs would come in handy!!) on the buddliea loop. But the noise at Radipole in general was brilliant, standing in the reeds you can't even hear a car over the mass of exploading cetti's warblers, chatting reed warblers and stuttering sedge warblers. There are a few lesser whitethroats popping around (the picture below looks a tad boring, I assure you they aren't!)

For your best chance to see one of these chaps hang around the new kingfisher silver access gate.

Yesterday I saw a few marsh harrier food passes right slap bang in front of the hide, I always think we forget how special it is to have these amazing raptors right in the middle of town, and to have such amazing views is almost unheard of.

Plenty of kingfisher action, although the pair nesting next to the sand martin wall were washed out in the floods, they should be back, it will just take them a few weeks to get back to business. There were also 4 white stork seen flying over the reserve so goodness knows what they are doing!

In other news i recommend the ham rolls in the centre! Delicious!

Chesil Beach hosts the only breeding colony of the Little Tern in the south-west. This beautiful bird is indeed little - about half the size of a common tern - and considerably less common. They migrate to Britain annualy after wintering off the western coast of Africa. The last two years have seen the best productivity ever at this colony at Ferrybridge which is now well on the way to recovery, after many years of decline. Much of this success is down to the time and effort put in by RSPB staff and volunteers applying management techniques successfully used at Great Yarmouth in Norfolk.

Photo - Luke Phillips 2011

Preparations for the 4^th year of the Chesil Bank Little Tern Recovery Project are well underway;  a hard-working team put up the electric fence (designed to discourage predators) in record time a couple of weeks ago. Wardening facilities have been greatly improved with a purpose-built hide replacing the tiny fisherman’s tent used last year.

The warden, John Dadds, is hoping that the improved facilities will encourage more people to volunteer their time to watch over the colony and protect the terns from the impact of disturbance and predation. Apart from the shelter and comfort it provides, it is also situated just a few metres from the heart of the colony and provides fantastic views of the terns nesting which most people only get to see from hundreds of metres away.

So if you would like to be a part of this conservation success story, please contact John on 07580 127065 or  john.dadds@btinternet.com for more information about the project.

All we need now is for the terns to settle in. They would normally be here in increasing numbers by now!

If you have visited Radipole since January you may have noticed that something has been missing. Not the wildlife of course, there have been all the usual suspects about like otter, kingfisher, water vole, the explosive cetti's warbler and the ever present marsh harrier and also some great new arrivals; yesterday in the sun you could hardly hear yourself think above the noise of sedge and reed warbler competing for space. I'm talking about us (well not necessarily me, but RSPB staff and volunteers nevertheless). Well I'm incredibly happy to announce that we're back (yes that is a good thing!). 

On Monday the 14th May come down to the reserve and join us as we open the brand new Wild Weymouth Discovery Centre and show it off. We are going to be joined by the mayor, our MP and various schools, RSPB folk and visitors alike so it would be great to see you there to show you around. You'll be able to have a local ice cream if it's sunny, but in the more likely event of the day being like the rest of the month so far you can enjoy a hot drink (which I must say is delicious!) and some locally made food. We'll be showing off all our new screens showcasing some of the reserves amazing wildlife and that's not all.

Visiting Radipole now, you can't fail to notice that there have been some additions out on the reserve too, and they are already going down a storm with visitors. All round the Buddleia loop there are new discovery points; a raised viewing platform with bench which offers a completely different view of the reserve out over the reeds (it's my favourite), there is a new short boardwalk cutting into the reeds out to a watery ditch (it was full of sticklebacks yesterday!) there is a new picnic area with some amazing wildlife themed benches where you can watch displaying great crested grebe and also a double jetty sticking out from the path.

And finally all the work couldn't have happened without the generous funding through the BALANCE project from EU INTERREG IV A 2 Seas Programme (see: www.balance-2seas.eu); Natural England’s Access to Nature initiative through the Big Lottery Fund’s Changing Spaces programme; and Defra & European Agricultural Fund for Rural Development through South West Coast Path, so a big thankyou to all involved.

Oh and a little bird tells me that if you were to pop down to the centre this week, you may find that the new Discovery Centre is already open for business!

A quick impromptu bat foray last night proved to be one of the best bat watching nights I’ve had at Radipole! Chris suggested we go out for a wander around the reserve to see what was going on. No sooner had he finished his sentence my coat was on and Armed with a torch and a bat detector we headed out to concrete bridge. We were greeted by several Noctule bats which are the largest species found in the UK. They are obvious due to their early evening appearance and their one foot wingspan. These were a first for Chris, which meant he was very excited about his encounter and has since described his excitement as being near the ‘upper limits on a scale of one to seventeen.’

Four other species were seen. Common and Soprano Pipistrelle, Serotine and one of my favourites, the Daubenton’s bat which is also occasionally called the water bat. The bats will pick up insects from the surface of the water, which was bad news for floating insects last night as Daubenton’s were out in force!

I’m afraid there’s no accompanying photograph as both Chris and myself find it very difficult taking photographs in the dark. Sorry!

We’ve previously blogged about our rather feminine looking
male Marsh Harrier but a picture taken today by regular visitor Steve Carey
proves that his femininity is restricted only to his plumage. Marsh Harrier
activity has been difficulty to keep track off this spring due to the comings
and goings of several different females. We’ve definitely had three different
females and possibly even a fourth but looks like our man has finally settled
on this one.

Water levels have now levelled out at Radipole after the
recent flooding so the Marsh Harriers and lots of other birds can now get on
with their spring activities though hopefully a little more discreetly than our
Harriers.  

We’ll let you know how things progress over the next few
weeks.