Trail Warden

Back after my Easter break I was immediately on the Broad. It had been open to the public for a few weeks now but it was my first time seeing it through a tourist's eyes. The signs currently lining the route are only temporary since the final articles weren't quite ready in time. This will soon be sorted and these temporary ones give us a chance to hear the visitors' opinions before the final pieces are made. Accompanying the new signs are numbers which reference a small booklet you can pick up at the start which talks more about the habitats, wildlife and broad. The wealth of information available is impressive and really enriches the walk - though it can be completed in about half an hour that amount of time really doesn't do it justice.

The contrast between the lush ground plants and
bare trees that define Spring

I'd missed the busy school holiday period, when the wardens had been meeting around seventy people a day, but there was still a stark difference between the Spring river activity and the emptiness of Winter; when the Nature Trail felt like a secret hideaway we could enjoy by ourselves - as glad as I am that so many people are enjoying the Broads I can't help but miss those days. A variety of people visited the trail and while not everyone took their time to slowly and patiently experience the trail, I hope they all got something out of the walk; there are a lot of wild residents to see on the trail if you're willing to wait for them.

Peacock butterfly bathing in the sunlight

In terms of wildlife the easiest group to see is, of course, birds which at this time of year will be performing some interesting behaviour. As I mentioned in a previous post the mallard ducks are getting ready to lay and this requires not only food but also a mate, and this requires courtship. While pairs like Grebes dance for each other and offer gifts, a female mallard looks for endurance by first loudly egging on the drakes so that when she takes flight they will follow. Naturally having more endurance than the drakes the race is to see who can keep up with her the longest, rather than who could catch her. The greylag geese who live on the Broad are also getting ready for mating season and while we didn't see any of them, we could clearly hear them fighting in the distance as we walked around the trail. The migrating terns, after whom the gravel platform in front of the bird hide is named, are starting to return to the Broad. However it is still early in the spring so instead the Egyptian geese enjoyed the Tern Raft while the terns themselves hunted overhead. As well as seeing the usual gadwalls, coots, robins and one heron, for the first time I saw a pair of long-tailed tits in the treetops. These small birds use feathers, spider's web and lichen to weave incredible nests which take a long time and a lot of effort to make, but are often vulnerable to attack. Because of this some adults find themselves without a nest and not enough time or energy to start again so instead they find relatives and help them raise their chicks so at least, if somewhat indirectly, they still help to pass on some of their DNA that season.

Hoveton Great Broad, soon to be covered by
the growing lily pads

The second most obvious creatures to see are bumblebees; their loud buzzing quickly gives them away so if you stop and look around you should easily be able to spot them. At the moment it is most likely Queen bees that you'll see; collecting pollen for the hive they are soon to create - though the aptly named early bumblebee may already have some workers out and about. The markings of bumblebees are quite distinct making them easy to identify - there are identification posters at the hut at the start of the trail if you can remember what you saw. Along with the Carder bee we also saw a Cuckoo bumblebee, which like it name suggests behaves a lot like the bird and parasitizes other bumblebee nests. There are also many butterflies on the trail including the orange-tip, speckled wood, brimstone and peacock. Orange-tips are easy to spot when flying but they have an interesting camouflage trick for when they land; the underside of their hind wings are mottled and mimic woodland vegetation so when they fold their wings and tuck their orange-tipped forewings behind their hind wings, they are practically invisible. Brimstone butterflies are also leaf mimics and it was actually their eggs I saw, rather than the individuals. If you look closely at the buds of purging and alder buckthorn around the trail you may be lucky enough to see a tiny green egg laid there.

A speckled wood butterfly resting after
aggressively seeing off a competitor

The tooth-edged leaf of saw-grass

As a warden I of course wasn't simply there to enjoy myself so during a quiet patch in the afternoon the other warden and I checked the path of overhanging vegetation. As well as getting in the way of visitors the brambles and rose bushes that also line the path can cause injury, especially if growing at pram height. Though being as it is the plants' home which we are simply visiting it seems a shame, if not downright rude, to cut off every 'inconvenient' branch so where possible we always tried to redirect the plants' growth by bending it behind a tree trunk or something similar. Plant identification is one of my weak areas, so as well as paying attention to the wildlife life I'm trying to learn common plants. For example the red current and black current bushes are very alike but also distinctly different; the latter has red flowers and sharply toothed leaves while the former has green flowers and softer leaves. Both are an important early nectar source for bees and butterflies.


        

My first of many days as a trail warden was a great one and I look forward to what more wildlife I can see and learn about.