Welney

Today we made a rather rushed visit to Welney Wash Nature Reserve. If you are not a member of the birdwatching fraternity you probably have no idea of the wonderful place on our doorstep, not far from the Isle of Ely, just over the border into Norfolk.

The heated viewing gallery and swan trap (on the right).

I first visited Welney when I worked for the Wildfowl and Wetland Trust (WWT) at Arundel in West Sussex where I was the education officer. Because our splendid new visitor centre was nowhere near completion, I was sent on a tour of the Trust's other centres, starting at the HQ at Slimbridge in Gloucestershire, then Martin Mere in Lancashire and Washington in Tyne and Wear. All of these brilliant places had a posh visitor centre, cafe and education programme. In those days, Welney was very different.

I was sent to stay with the local warden Josh Scott and his wife and I spent a pleasant enough spring week birdwatching from the hides and talking to the very few visitors who dropped in. Josh pretty much ignored me saying that Welney needed an education officer very much, but only to drive a JCB and to round up cattle. To him I was pretty much the sort of young man that a fensman like him might keep as a pet. I don't remember him trying to teach me anything, which is a shame because he was quite a character and a bit of a local hero with a lifetime's experience of the fens and particularly the wildfowl that lived there.

I watched the departure of the last wintering wildfowl and the arrival of the summer waders, many of which I saw for the first time. Ruffs were not breeding there but the males gathered in dozens to show off their remarkable and exotic hoods and capes in the courtship lecking grounds. My top bird was a visiting spotted redshank; a leggy male with jet black plumage set off by blood red legs and a fine stiletto bill.

On Wednesday morning Josh asked me where I was staying that night. This came as a bit of a shock as I was told that I was booked in for the week. "My wife doesn't do B+B on a Wednesday, it's our night off." I didn't know what to say. I had no money and nowhere to go. I should have just left, written Welney off and gone back to Arundel. Instead, I decided to make the most of the opportunity to visit new places and so I popped over to Rutland Water in Northamptonshire and spent the night in my old Moskvitch car. It was quite a cold night and the local police came and woke me several times but didn't move me on. By dawn I was frozen and hungry so I banged on the door of the wardens cottage and he gave me breakfast.  Tim Appleton was also a bit of a legend and someone I would meet again many times. Sadly, I never got to know Josh Scott. At Rutland I saw my first wild garganey and some black terns, so in my mind, the trip was a success.

The flooded washes: wildfowl heaven.

I really got to know Welney better when I left the WWT and went to work for the RSPB in Scotland and then at the Lodge in Sandy. The visitor facilities were always basic, made up of several porta-cabins joined together, but the attitude of the staff and volunteers and the quirkiness of the place made it loved by many. The main feature of the site was an elevated bridge that led to the reserve proper,  across the road and a fen drain, ending at an elevated glazed and centrally heated viewing gallery that looked north across the wash. In winter the fields would flood and hundreds of Bewick's and whooper swans would gather there to be fet under floodlights.

That wildfowl spectacular is still the main attraction today but now there is a lot to see in the summer too. The giant shed that is the main visitor facility was mocked at first by those who loved the old porta cabins, but I'm sure attitudes have changed. This is the best place I know to stop for a decent lunch and watch birds at the same time.

Drake scaup.

And so it was today. We arrived with less than three hours to spare and made for the restaurant where we both ordered coffees and spicy chicken goulash with cous-cous. I would have called it more of a tagine really and it was delicious. Best of all we had a window seat looking over the scrapes and wet flashes of the new grounds to the south. We had already heard a Cetti's warbler in the car park and seen a flock of tree sparrows which made the trip worthwhile in itself, but out there in the wet fields we spotted egrets, reed buntings, redshanks, lapwings, greylags and, best of all, avocets. Way off in the distance two small groups of roe deer were feeding in the arable fields.

Over on the wash the wildfowl numbers had greatly decreased since our last visit as they had mostly migrated north, but we saw a few gems including bean geese and a cattle egret. The top birds for the day were a drake scaup (a maritime relative of the black and white tufted ducks that are common in urban parks) and roughly 60 black tailed godwits in various stages of moult, many in full rust-red dress.

Black-tailed godwit.

If you have never been to Welney you definitely should!