Collins Where to See Wildlife in Britain and Ireland by Christopher Somerville

Author:Christopher Somerville
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers

By the 1970s, otters (Lutra lutra) were on the brink of extinction in the Norfolk Broads; but careful management of the riverbanks has seen them return to most rivers in the region.

On Buckenham Marshes in Norfolk, keep your eyes peeled in winter for England’s only wintering flock of bean geese (Anser fabalis).

10 BUCKENHAM MARSHES, NORFOLK

Freshwater marsh

East of Norwich in the Yare Valley, Buckenham Marshes are home to big numbers of birds – breeding lapwing and avocet in spring and summer (vociferously defending their chicks from marsh harriers), and wintering flocks of teal, white-fronted geese and thousands of wigeon and golden plover. Keep an eye out for large geese with orange legs and dark backs lined with creamy bars – these will be England’s only established wintering flock of bean geese, in from the northern Scandinavian tundra.

11 BERNEY MARSHES AND BREYDON WATER, NORFOLK

Freshwater marsh

If you’re looking for enormous numbers of wild birds, then come in winter to this large reserve of open water, mudflats, reedbeds and wet marsh grassland in the flat country just inland of Great Yarmouth. Shelter, food, and safety and warmth in numbers are the main incentives that draw up to 30,000 golden plover, 25,000 each of lapwing and wigeon and 15,000 pink-footed geese to spend the winter here. They form a remarkable spectacle, whether down on the grass and mud or up in the air. The reserve is wonderful in spring, too, when the marshes are loud with nesting waders – listen for the rapid piping of redshank and the creaky calls of lapwing as they tumble about the sky.

12 WINTERTON DUNES, NORFOLK

Heath/Sand dunes

Most of the lime has been leached out of Winterton Dunes, leaving an acid ground where heath has grown. Marsh harriers hunt and nightjars breed on the heath; little terns and ringed plover nest on the stonier ground near the sea; and the warm shallow pools in the dune slacks have populations of newts and of natterjack toads with their distinctive yellow spine stripe.

13 RANWORTH BROAD, NORFOLK

Former peat diggings

Ranworth Broad National Nature Reserve is designed with families in mind. The Visitor Centre is a marvel in itself, a floating thatched pagoda that lies out at the far end of a boardwalk trail (or reachable by boat or canoe). Following the trail with its excellent information boards, you walk in reverse through the successive stages by which a broad reverts from open water through sedge and reed fen to wet carr woodland and finally to mature dry oakwood. Listen out for songbirds in the woods, and look for swallowtail butterflies, dragonflies and reed warblers in the fen and reedbeds.

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