St Nicks

Highlights Winter birds still with us, but signs of Spring.. First hoverfly of the year enjoys the snowdrops, while beetle is one-in-a-thousand Weather Cool (4 – 9C) but with some sunny intervals. The Wildwatch team stayed dry! Birds Winter visitors are, not surprisingly, still with us! Two Redwings flew over on the 8th and there […]

A report on 8th March 2017 One Planet York Mingle, by Ivana Jakubkova (St Nicks Events Officer who co-organised the event.) Food is something that we all need and it has big impacts far beyond our plates. With around 200,000 residents in York, we are talking at least 600,000+ food choices every day. These choices […]

This week our Recycling Coordinator Sam Taylor has swapped one resource for another in order to give us a quick and simple explanation of energy sources and renewables for British Science Week. If you are interested in physics (or even if you’re not), you may know that energy cannot be made or destroyed but is […]

Woodlice are not the most exciting creatures to be found at St Nicholas Fields, but they are an important part of the reserve’s fauna and appropriately are very good recyclers! It is well-known that around the country woodlice are called by many different and sometimes amusing names like Roly-Poly, Billy-button, Pea Bug, Chisel Bob, Chuckywig, […]

After getting tonnes of questions, our Recycling Coordinator Sam Taylor wrote a blog in the hope of clearing up some of the confusion around plastics… Aren’t all plastics recyclable? How do you make a plastic anyway? Why will you recycle a plastic bottle but not a yoghurt pot? Well, read on to find out the […]

Highlights Long tailed screecher – new bird at St Nicks.. bugs sunbathe while beetles hide in the dark.. brains seen all round the reserve. Weather The first Wildwatch Wednesday of the year was cold but sunny, and we enjoyed some sunshine on all but one of the four Wednesdays. Temperatures ranged from 4o – 8o […]

The Water Rail (Rallus aquaticus) is a skulking, furtive member of the same bird family as Coot and Moorhen. The latter is quite often see on the becks at St Nicks, Coots almost never and the same for Water Rail until.. ..on the 3rd December 2014, a solitary member of the Wildwatch team was standing […]

Highlights Over-wintering summer visitor? .. skulking rail still present.. blank on Shieldbugs..return of Water Vole.. Lemon Disco! Weather Not surprisingly, temperatures fell throughout the month. 12C was recorded on 7th December, falling to 2C on the 28th, the latter day being bright, sunny and “nithering”! Birds The long-staying Water Rail was seen on all four […]

Our Recycling Coordinator Sam Taylor shares her tips for reducing waste at Christmas. Please always check with your local council if you are unsure whether materials are recyclable at the kerbside. This is my “bah humbug” approach to Christmas. Not really. I love Christmas, but I hate waste and for some reason Christmas really is […]

Post written by Jonathan Dent, St Nicks Nature Reserve Manager, who leads our heritage skills courses As the seasons change, our attention shifts from work in the grasslands and becks to our maturing woodland areas. We are in the middle of a five-year plan of thinning, developed with the help of our local Forestry Commission […]