A Turkey, a Tiger and much more

On Thursday the 13th December we had our team christmas outing. We met Paul Eele the RSPB's reserve manager for Titchwell. Paul gave us an interesting introduction to the reserve and their management of it. We then spent the morning walking around the reserve with most of us reaching the hide complex and beach.

Countryside manager Victoria won the award for the best / strangest hat ever seen at Titchwell or anywhere come to think of it (see below).

Victoria with Keith, Marilyn and Millie, my dog who was too embarrassed to look

We then made our way to Briarfields hotel for lunch which all 31of us agreed was a wonderful meal. Even our resident Tiger was full at the end (see below). 

  Rob won a pint for wearing this, well deserved I think!

On Friday 14th December Eddie and George did the latest seal pup count which was 1165, already well over 200 more than the total count from last Winter. Now that the pups have started leaving the colony, we now only count new born pups and add to our previous total, which is fairly easy to do as they grow so fast. BBC Winterwatch have now finished filming the seals, watch out for it early in 2013, we have not got a specific date yet.

On Monday the 17th the monthly WeBS (Wetlands Bird Survey) count was done by splitting the reserve into sections and a member of staff or volunteer counting each section. Nothing remarkable was seen but all the usual suspects were present

In the past week a couple of the channel marker buoys have broken off their moorings and washed up in amongst the seal colony. Iain and myself decided the best way to get them back to the Harbour Boatmens Association was to pick them up by boat and return them to Morston quay for any repairs to be done. We did this on Monday on the early morning tide.

After finishing this I went to empty Blakeney Parish Councils car park machine on the Carnser only to find the whole machine had been stolen. About an hour after it was reported, I received a call from the Police to say it had been found,  lying in many pieces on the side of the road . This means for the sake of a few pounds several thousand pounds damage has been done. We are liaising with the Parish clerk about a replacement machine but this will take several weeks so you may not see the regular site of the hut on the quay for a while.

Finally for now George, Paul and I accompanied Langham School on a visit to Blakeney Point to see the Seals. I hope they had as much fun as we did taking them.

Graham Lubbock Coastal Ranger

Ps this is my first blog post, let me know what you think!