During the cold weather, in December, three parties of pink-footed geese landed on the marsh. One flock, of 73, spent almost the whole day down on the marsh. A party of 21 were seen on another day and then a group of 14 were recorded feeding for several hours.

Pink-footed Goose   CAC

A merlin, which was seen chasing after finches, from the marsh hide, was not successful. A female marsh harrier over-flew the marsh around this time but did not stop. A little egret, first seen on December 14th, was feeding in a gutter on the marsh and although it stayed for a couple of days was seldom seen.

A party of eight grey partridge was an unusual record on the decoy, for a bird that has been getting low in numbers, in recent years. 

The numbers of duck recorded during December was good, with day counts of 447 teal, 75 mallard, 2 wigeon and 8 shoveler. During this period, up to 5 cormorants and 9 grey herons roosted in the dead trees.

A surprise find on New Years day was a treecreeper: a bird not normally seen here. A party of 12 long-tailed tits spent some time around the feeding station during January.

Because of a gas gun going off every fifteen minutes, to scare off wood pigeons from a nearby field of oilseed rape, duck numbers were quite low during most of January. The maximum recorded on any day during this period was 45 Teal, 21 mallard and 3 Shoveler.

Two tufted ducks made several short visits during January and were seen again in early February. Up to two little grebes and a coot were recorded on the pond at this time.

Male Tufted Duck   CAC

A kingfisher, which was seen on the 10th January and again over the next few days, was possibly the same bird, seen at the Pickerings Scrape Pool, around the same time.

On January 12th, two short-eared owls were seen from the marsh hide, hunting at dusk on the marsh. At least one of these birds stayed around until January 16th.   

A woodcock was seen during the cold spell of weather on January 16th and two were recorded on January 24th.  On the same day, a greylag goose was on the marsh, with over 600 canada geese and a large flock of 700 dunlin.

In the cold weather, good numbers of greenfinch and chaffinch and at least three different great spotted woodpeckers were using the feeders, together with the usual tit species.

During January a BTCV work party renewed the steps on the marsh hide and planted about 100 trees: mainly oaks, to replace the dying large oaks, which resulted from the flooding, several years ago.

A raven was noted, several times, feeding on the marsh and, on occasions, landing in the oak trees on the decoy. At the end of the month, a large flock of 200 fieldfares used the decoy for over a week to roost overnight. A grey wagtail was also recorded, by the decoy pool, on several occasions.

A dog fox was present, on a couple of days in late January, no doubt looking for a mate. Several wood mice found the food dropped from the bird feeders to their liking and fed out in the open, even in broad daylight.

During the high tides, in early February, large numbers of waders were using the marsh to roost out the high tide, with counts of 2000 dunlins, 190 redshanks, 500 lapwings and 11 turnstones. With the abundance of waders, a female peregrine falcon spent several days roosting on a log on the marsh and making the occasional sortie after the waders or woodpigeons.

A Kingfisher turned up on February 12th and two little grebes were seen displaying on the main pond. Several skylarks were singing and displaying on the marsh, on sunny days.

Little Grebe   CAC 

About mid month, a female stonechat was found on the marsh and 3 short eared owls were recorded, (We assume these were different birds than those recorded in early January.) At least 2 of these owls stayed around until nearly the end of the month. One gave excellent views, when flying close by the marsh hide.

By the end of February, at least five herons were observed roosting in the trees.