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EFC Centre at Wat Tyler Country ParkOur centre is available for visits on a pre-booked basis on Wednesdays between 10am - 4pm. The Club’s activities and displays are also usually open to the public on the first Saturday of the month 11am - 4pm.

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The weblog below is for naturalists to use to report interesting sightings, ask questions, report on field meetings and generally post pictures and any information or questions generally relevant in some way to the wildlife and geology of Essex. You will need to register and be logged-on to post to the forum, and you need to upload pictures first, for use in posts. Find out more


Wed 17th April 2013 19:30 by Mary Smith
It looks as though Spring is here to stay....
In early March I wrote a bit about spring had sprung, when about 3 days later it had changed its mind and we were back to winter. But now I see everyone is writing about spring, and quite right too. Two weeks ago my husband and I wandered in Belhus Woods Country Park and there were no flowers to be seen, except some old Hazel catkins, but not much else. I was supposed to lead a guided wild-flower walk, but I cancelled it as there were no flowers!

But today, we saw oodles of Lesser Celandine and Sweet Violets, Early Dog-violets, Wood Anemones, Ground-ivy, even Greater Stitchwort, all open in the afternoon sunshine. All sorts of birds were shouting and making pre-mating noises, including the Yaffle Bird, whose other name is the Green Woodpecker. We saw a Brimstone butterfly, which I know is an early one, and my husband saw a Bee-fly.

Up by the newish lake at Hunts Hill (following gravel extraction and now a flooded hollow) the plants of Blinks were in full and glorious flower, and so were many plants of Whitlow-grass.  But the early Forget-me-not had not appeared. In contrast, Blinks is usually in flower in February and March, and has usually gone by now, and the Whitlow-grass not far behind.

In the woods there were loads of Bluebell plants, but leaves nowhere near fully grown and no flower stems to see, let alone flowering.  I think they will need another two or three weeks at least. Usually they are in flower here in mid April.

We also noticed a large amount of water lying around, making ponds where usually there are none, and tiny pools had become lakes. I have not seen so much water since early 2001, when we had floods everywhere. But we have not had much rain recently, so what is going on I have no idea!

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