Donna Nook National Nature Reserve

Grey Seals at Donna Nook Nature Reserve, LincolnshireDonna Nook is situated in the East of England on the Lincolnshire coast. The Grey Seals arrive in their hundreds in November and stay until the beginning of January, giving birth and mating.

It is amazing to see them all there. I confess I spent two days there photographing them! I sent a few images to my Mum and she asked me if they ever moved! Well, yes they do but not a lot, they spend most of the time resting and sleeping!

Grey Seals at Donna Nook Nature Reserve, Lincolnshire - New bornThe second day I was lucky to see a bit more activity; mating and a pup being born. Unfortunately, the latter happened very quickly and I only spotted it happening out of the corner of my eye so didn’t get to capture a photograph.

The wardens are very knowledgeable and can tell you which cows are still to give birth etc. They also advise you not to visit on a weekend as it is extremely busy. I went in the week and although there were a lot of people it was easy to see the seals. Some of the pups seem very inquisitive about the humans that are stood watching them. The cows always have an eye on the pups and if the humans are making too much noise then they seem to lay between the noise and the pup to protect them.

If visiting the site there is a main car park and an overflow if you don’t manage to get a space. The main car park gets full very early and the overflow is a farmer’s field but it does have portaloos! The nearest toilets are otherwise in North Somercotes village. Look out for the cute little gift shop where they also accept donations 🙂

This year, there were 1798 pups born at Donna Nook. You can follow the progress of numbers on Twitter @DonnaNookWarden

Autumn 2014

Robin at Waters' Edge Country Park, LincolnshireSo Autumn is now over and we have moved into Winter. Its been so mild this year that it’s really only just started to feel like Winter!

Taking images for Autumn has had its challenges. The main one being dark evenings! Not being able to go out after work and take photographs has really reduced the time I have for shooting. The added bonus was, I had a week away in Lincolnshire that enabled me to take a few images that I wouldn’t have normally taken. This has led me to the decision that I need to take some annual leave in each season this year!

Again I had my list of ‘finds’ and I didn’t do too badly this time, but that might be because I based some of them around the area I was visiting!

The key Autumn image for me was the Grey Seal pups. I have never seen them in the wild until last years visit to Donna Nook – I will put another post on it with more detail/photos soon. I had also never seen a Fly Agaric either until this year, so I did make some great discoveries!

What I missed photographing was the changing colour of the leaves…I know, the most basic Autumn image! I just seemed to miss the best times to go out and shoot, so it will be at the top of the list for this year!