Spartina/Cord Grass Control

As far as work on the estate and wider properties we also run, myself and the team have been very very busy bees indeed; over at Rockcliffe a lot of our time has been dominated by Spartina! Spartina is a non native invasive cord grass which can rapidly take over mud flats, so we started an initiative to control this pest 3 years ago, by covering them in plastic, pegging it down and waiting for the plant to die.....

A action shot of Dave and Judy pulling up a plastic sheets with a tonne of mud on.

Yesterday, the Coastal Ranger Nick, from the Solway Firth Partnership came to help with a team of dedicated volunteers. Thanks for your help Nick!

At the mains, the winter tree work starts! I’ll keep you posted...



Filming at Night at the Reserve

Some guys were doing some filming at night on the reserve yesterday, with some pretty sophisticated bits of kit. Check out their website... http://www.thenightvisionshow.tv/

Super Cool Moth

Check out this super cool moth Judy found under an Oak tree we were cutting up;

The food plant for the caterpillar is Oak leaves and it is rare and only locally distributed in Scotland.

First Frost

First 'proper' frost 4th November

Autumn and Geese!

We are well and truly within the grips of Autumn, Red deer are rutting, the trees are heaving with berries and it hasn’t stopped raining for 2 weeks!

Most importantly the Autumn means the changing of the guard on the reserve, the summer migrants leave and the winter migrants arrive.  Bringing with them Geese, Swans and Wildfowl (Anatidae family). The gathering of these in such high densities is one the things that makes Threave NNR such a special place, giving it it’s RAMSAR designation – a wetland of International importance. 



12 Whoopers coming into the newly flooded marsh!



Currently on the wetland we have copious amounts of pink-footed and greylag geese, whooper swans in large family groups regularly visiting and probably most exiting of all Greenland White-Fronted geese, look out for these rare geese (sometimes mixed in with the pinks), 200 approx have been spotted on the reserve.



A photo, of a few thousand geese coming in to roost on the wetland at the reserve. What a sight and sound!

On the wider estate Thruses (Turdidae), Redwing and Field fare mainly, from Scandinavia, have been seen in their hundreds moving through, a good place to see them is along the railway line, picking off the berries.