Plantsbrook Nature Reserve.

Great to pay Plantsbrook Nature Reserve a much overdue visit this morning especially when one of my favourite water birds was on the biggest pool, I always love to see Shoveler, what a great looking bird, also great to see was a Muscovy Duck, another great looking bird.

There wasn't a huge variety of birds present but the birds that were there were represented in good numbers, shame I didn't see or hear any House Sparrow though, hopefully they are still resident at this location and I just happened not too spot any.

Talking of animals in good numbers there was definitely a lot of Grey Squirrels and Brown Rats, the Squirrels were there usual selves and were here, there and everywhere around you and finding any seed you put down for the birds, still they have to eat as well, there were far more rats than you'd normally expect to see and they were fairly tame as well, even though they'd run straight in front of you, they would then stop and have a good look at you, at least they are in their 'normal' habitat.

Plantsbrook is like any open space with trees at the moment, namely that of being a great place to visit, it's no good driving past somewhere in your car, or watching the television and saying look at all those wonderful colours, go out there and experience it for yourself especially when there is so much Fungi to find, what with the dead or dying trees and plentiful amounts of dead wood to be found at this location there were many great varieties to found today.

Birds seen today were, Blue Tit, Great Tit, Long Tailed Tit, Chaffinch, Wren, Robin, Jackdaw, Carrion Crow, Magpie, Blackbird, Cormorant, Pied Wagtail, Grey Wagtail, Great Crested Grebe, Moorhen, Coot, Shoveler, Tufted Duck, Mallard and Muscovy Duck, strangely there were no Canada Goose present at all, saying that on the drive there, plenty could be seen in the adjacent Pype Hayes Park.

Great to see so little litter and believe me I've picked up my fair share from here in the past and the general state of the place looked great as well, I don't normally give a 'plug' to anyone on here but if you're on Twitter be sure to give Friends of Plants Brook Local Nature Reserve a follow.