Confession ...

We’ve lived in this area for over 50 years, but I confess we have never visited the Roding Valley Meadows Nature Reserve, which is practically on our doorstep. Awful, isn’t it? This afternoon we rectified the omission and are trying not to beat ourselves up for not going sooner.

Roding Valley Meadows was previously occupied by RAF Chigwell (from 1938-1964), before being declared a local nature reserve in 1986, and it’s possible to see signs of its former use dotted around, such as barrage balloon rotundas and concrete tracks. It is the largest remaining species-rich water meadow in Essex, with lovely wildflowers and many different habitats, all a short distance from the lake shown in the photo. 

Today I spotted a male Southern Migrant Hawker dragonfly and a green damselfly (whose name I don’t know), a Speckled Wood butterfly (I think), masses of blackberries and also sloe berries. There are kingfishers there as well, apparently, but we didn’t see one today. As the sighting of my first ever kingfisher is very high up on my wish list, you can be sure we will be going back regularly from now on!