The Young Birder

I recently went to the Avalon Marshes in Somerset which  is a fantastic place for wildlife and home to many amazing species as you will see. Reedbeds carpet the marshes where  people have lived and worked  e ver since the Neolithic era, over 5000 years ago.  Until the 1990's, vast quantities of peat were extracted and during the 1960's, over 65,000 tonnes were being taken out every year. Although peat extraction is still happening it is on a much smaller scale and much of the area is now  a superb mix of habitats, such as reedbed, lakes, woodland, mires, and large wet meadows, the soil black with peat. My favourite photo of the trip was this one of a Cattle Egret, one of 8 individuals which were feeding around the cows feet in a meadow.  Cattle Egrets ( Bubulcus ibis ) are  native to South East Asia, north and tropical Africa and mainland Europe. The first time Cattle Egrets were reported in the UK was in December 2007, when o ver 200 birds were r...

I'm starting off this post with a lovely Common Whitethroat, taken at Whixall Moss, Shropshire. Whixall Moss is surrounding by 2 other mosses (Fenn's and Bettisfield) and straddles the border between England and Wales. Sadly, peat was being extracted from it until 1989 - a year later the Nature Conservancy Council bought 170 acres of Whixall Moss, 640 acers of Fenn's Moss and 112 acres of Bettisfield M oss.  In later years, they bought another 363 acres of Fenn's Moss and 55 acres of Whixall Moss.  The Mosses are now a superb mix of peat bog, woodland and heath. They also have the largest population of a nationally scarce dragonfly species, the White-faced Darter, as well as Adders, breeding Curlew,  Hobby,  Cuckoo and Skylark among many other species. The odd rarity too has turned up too; a White Tailed Sea eagle being the most recent and largest! There are many plant species on the Mosses too, such as Sundew, 18 species of bog moss, Lesser Bladderwort and...