At least three Nightingales are being heard by our mature woodland edge pretty much every day and Cuckoos are being quite regularly seen on the reserve and nearby to it. We have had Arctic, Sandwich and Black terns seen with the Common terns and a Bonaparte’s gull visited the site recently. A first for Abberton. There has been a handsome Black-throated diver seen out on the water too. Whitethroat, Lesser whitethroat, Blackcap and Chiffchaff are also present. Butterflies being seen at the moment include an early Small heath, Orange tip, Peacock, Speckled wood and Common blue. For the reserve volunteers May is a time to catch up on some maintenance tasks as we have finished tree planting for the season and we are only grass cutting the footpaths and events meadow. Other areas will be left to flower now. We have had to take care in our work yard as we have had two female mallards on nests in there. One under some fencing materials and another under an old sink! ‘Fencing duck’ recently led her 10 ducklings out to the visitor centre pond where they can be seen from the Skylark tearoom. We are pleased that even our work areas are good for wildlife!