In the past couple of weeks we have done three things in the meadows:

A Whitebeam has been planted down by the pond in memory of a much loved mother who died last month. She had a huge Whitebeam by the back door of her home and last year it had Nuthatches nesting in it. Every year it produced a blanket of orange berries that fell and were adored by the birds. We hope that, in time, our new Whitebeam might prove to be equally as popular.

We are trying to improve the habitat around the pond – provide increased protection for amphibians and more cover and perches for birds. Eventually, we might build a hide overlooking this area and envisage the two of us holed up in there with our binoculars and photographic equipment and coffee in a flask. Well, you’ve got to have a plan and dreams and this is one of ours.

But as a small step in this direction, we have put a feeder up by the pond to start to encourage more activity in the area. Filled it with sunflower seeds with the husks still on which we haven’t got in feeders elsewhere and which seemed to be very popular in the feeders at reserves we visited on a recent birding trip to Norfolk.

Thirdly, we have put a quirky bird box up in an ivy covered tree in the boundary with the cliff.We saw these boxes for sale in Sandwich Bay Bird Observatory and couldn’t resist the upcycling nature of it. We saw two wrens in this tree this morning and so this is where the box has gone since it is good for Robins or Wrens.