Warnham LNR Heronry

Many of the visitors will have seen the Heronry at Warnham LNR is starting to become quite active with lots of adults coming and going with various twigs and branches. Our first pair is already seemingly sitting on eggs which is often the case that this particular pair seems to be incredibly early. So myself and one of the volunteer headed round to see if we could see any other clues as to how many other pairs had started nest building.



Classic signs of nesting Grey Heron's

As soon as we entered the Millpond Plantation I started to find some signs. Above you can seen several sprigs of greenery. Most of the twigs they use are Scot's Pine, Norway Spruce or Leylandii. The small fresh twigs are saved for the actual lining of the nest so it appears a lot of our Heron's are already lining their existing nests. Pine-type twigs are used to line the nests as they give off an odour that repels flies and other insects thus putting off some of the bug  life that may be attracted to the fishy bowl the Grey Heron's call a nest!

Hatches Grey Heron Egg

Hopefully in the coming weeks we will start to find many of the hatched out eggs (pictured above) around the bases of the nest trees. Last year was a very good year at the reserve for Grey Heron's so hopefully we will have another successful year.