Join us on the 27th and 28th of April for birding and optics sessions! Ask the expert from Viking your questions and go on a walk with a warden learning about our reserve and its inhabitants.
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Wetland Word of the Week 8
This week's word is... ... fen. A fen is the kind of wetland that is characterised by having alkaline or neutral water and peaty soil. They have lots of dissolved minerals. What we know as 'the Fens', an area of East Anglia, has largely been drained for a
22 April 2024
Holy moly, it's holy grass!
You may be asking “why are you so excited about a kind of grass?” but as the name says, holy grass is pretty special. Found across Eurasia and the Americas, Hierochloe odorata, or holy grass as it is known in the UK, is a marshland species, particul
19 April 2024
What has Hippocrates got to do with Caerlaverock?
Although I work at a nature reserve, as a member of the visitor centre team, I find myself spending most of my time indoors in the office. My main daily interactions with nature are watering the office plants and gazing out the windows at the trees and bi
17 April 2024
Pimp my hide - artist call out
Peter Scott, the founder of the WWT, had a thing about hides. He had a real eye for putting them in the right position and working out how to get the watcher high up. One of the things that makes Caerlaverock special are the number of places on the site w
16 April 2024
Wetland Word of the Week 7
This week's word is...scurvy grass. It is a plant found out on our saltmarsh. They are low and creeping plants with white flowers. It has a high Vitamin C content meaning it used to be valued for its help in preventing scurvy, which is where it gets its c
15 April 2024
Goosey Goosey Gander, a review
Murder in the marshes! No – not a marsh harrier catching its dinner but a conservationist shot on the edge of the River Severn. Is nobody safe?Goosey Goosey Gander by Frank Edwards is set on a wetland reserve not far from WWT Slimbridge and has illustra
13 April 2024
Goodbye to the geese
The last weekend of March was jam-packed with events centred around saying goodbye to one of our favourite winter migrants, the beloved barnacle geese. The weekend started with a dusk Wardlaw walk, where lots of geese were seen flying into roost, despite
10 April 2024
Wetland Word of the Week 6
Our 6th wetland word is... ... petrichor meaning the pleasant scent that occurs when it rains on dry ground. I don't know about you but for me, it evokes the feeling of a summer sky, pregnant with heavy clouds when suddenly a drop at a time, the downpour
8 April 2024
Seasonal Sights
With a fresh spring breeze in the air, I head towards Sharp's Lookout to try and get a glimpse of the black tailed godwit in breeding plumage that has been showing well recently on the Folly Pond. Binoculars up, scanning the horizon with sunlight sparklin
6 April 2024
A spring walk
A wren calls from somewhere, as yet unseen. It seems to be yelling at me to pay attention and I eventually spot it, on a little branch shouting with all its tiny might. A loud voice for one so small.Then there is the drone of a bee, a queen most likely. S
4 April 2024
Wetland Word of the Week 5
For week 5, the wetland word is our name... Caerlaverock. It is the name of our reserve, the neighbouring NNR, a local castle and the parish we are all in. The word comes from 'caer' meaning castle and 'laverock' meaning skylark. We love knowing the origi
1 April 2024
A clattering of jackdaws
As part of Words for Weltands, our team have been turning their hand to nature writing in whatever form that takes. So in the spirit of that, here is a poem about jackdaws.One voice followed by another followed by dozens.Shouting, yelling, cawing.Look up
31 March 2024
A knee injury won't stop me
Normally I'm running about the reserve, fixing fences, cross-cutting wood, building nest boxes the list goes on. I almost never sit still. However, for the last couple of weeks this has not been the case. A knee injury has left me predominantly stuck indo
29 March 2024
Between showers, spring arrives
We've been enjoying a seasonal shift in some of our wildlife sightings here at Caerlaverock. Spring showers, between blue skies and rainbows, are beckoning tree buds to leaf, blossoms to emerge and more flowers to begin blooming. Since the rafts have been
27 March 2024
Wetland Word of the Week 4
For week 4, our wetland word of the week is...... firth. A firth is a narrow inlet of the sea or an estuary. It comes from the old Norse for fjord. In Scotland, famous firths include the Firth of Forth, the Moray Firth and of course, our own Solway Firth.
25 March 2024