On Tuesday morning February 16 from 10am to 12 noon, the Rye Harbour Nature Reserve had a drop in session to show children how to make various items of bird food and it was beautiful day with full sun and no breeze, unusual for this area lately.
I arrived about 11am and it was fairly quiet, but there were two families there with four children busy making bird feed. The choices were fat balls or heart and star shaped flat feeders.
The flat feeders were coated with lard and covered with coloured suet pieces and both the ball and the flat feeders looked very colourful and should attract any number of birds.
I spoke to Lucy Bowyer who was running the event and she said that she was run off her feet at the beginning when 23 children showed up and from then on it was a slow stream of families.
It is a great place to visit when the sun is out and it is only a short walk from the car park at Rye Harbour and, if you want to search for some of the bird visitors to the nature reserve, there are volunteers available to point you in the right direction – and a number of hides (huts) from which to watch the birds without frightening them.
Photo: Ray Prewer