HABITAT ZONES
West Dunes
The west dunes formed about 100 years ago and are ‘mature’ with sycamore, ash, poplar, elm towards the north and hawthorn and elder towards the south: Clematis vitalba is now covering large areas. The top of the dune ridge meets resident’s gardens, which contain some of the more mature trees and garden rubbish, dumped over many years, has produced large areas of plants such as Russian Vine. The eastern edge is predominantly sea buckthorn. There is a wide variety of other plants shrubs and grasses the most eye catching being pyramidal orchid, great mullein, rosebay willowherb and evening primrose.
A good variety of birds nest in these wooded areas and the cover is used by migrating birds, particularly when the easterly winds are strong.
Central Dunes
There are a number of dunes towards the centre of the marsh, predominantly covered in sea buckthorn, elder and dog rose.
Outer Dunes
These outer dune ridges formed over the last 40/50 years and are eroding at the sea buckthorn covered northern end and forming and spreading slowly seawards towards the south; the leading edge of marram has progressed some 50 meters in the last 11 years. The outer ridge was breached by the sea, just south of the boat compound in September 2001, thought to have been caused by the introduction of ‘rock armour’ on Lagoon Walk.
Vegetation varies from dense sea buckthorn in the north to marram, lyme-grass and prickly-saltwort in the south. Sea buckthorn is generally spreading southwards along the ridge.
Plants that make a visual impact are sea-holly, pyramidal orchid and ragwort.
Beach
The beach is constantly changing profile with shingle ridges regularly appearing following strong winds and these provide an ideal habitat for nesting birds in the spring. A number of ringed plover nests are usually noted but are largely predated or disturbed by the public; however young chicks are subsequently seen in the area.
At low water, a wide variety of sea birds can be seen feeding and roosting, the more regular being Black Headed Gull, Herring Gull, Greater and Lesser Black Backed Gulls, Oyster Catcher, Knot and Redshank. The tide wrack also forms a rich feeding ground for a variety of birds and Sanderling, Dunlin, Skylark, Wheatear and Snow Bunting are seen at various times of the year.
Saltmarsh
The saltmarsh began forming some 40/50 years ago and in general can be considered as ‘mature’, the main cover being rough sea grasses with some buckthorn scrub. Although complete tidal cover of the marsh is rare it still occurs at the highest spring tides (sea water surges through the breach in the dunes at high tide and is met by water from Greenshank Creek up to one hour later) sometimes to depths above 1 metre. At other times there is spread from tidal creeks and enlargement of lagoon areas.
Many interesting plants appear during the year and amongst those that catch the eye, are sea-lavenders, and sea aster: there are some species of grass on this site, which are not well represented on the NNR.
There is a network of pathways created by the public and these are broadened and kept short by the high number of rabbits. Very little damage can be attributed to this foot traffic and the shorter grasses appear to allow other species of grass and plant to survive.
The marsh is an important nesting area for skylark, reed bunting and meadow pipit and many pairs can be seen in the breeding season.
Tidal Creeks
The main flow of water enters Greenshank Creek on the NNR and slowly flows up the network of smaller creeks, spreading almost as far as Beach Road, with levels peaking about I hour later than the published tide tables for Skegness. This only occurs at spring tides for a period of up to 5 days and on peak tides they overflow to fill the small lagoons.
Vegetation along these creeks and in some cases far wider is typical with sea-purslane, annual sea-blite, samphire and spartina.
The creeks abound with shrimps, small fish fry, larger flat fish, crabs, etc and provide important feeding for birds; small cuttlefish have been seen as far north as the Derby Avenue bridge. In addition to redshank, curlew, whimbrel and black headed gull, the occasional kingfisher is seen and little egrets have stayed for a number of weeks. In early summer, little terns can be seen diving into the creeks and lagoons.
Lagoons
There are a number of small lagoons, some of which dry up for a number of weeks in the summer. Vegetation and birds are similar to those of the creeks.
By far the largest lagoon is Seacroft Lagoon of which approximately one third is in the SSSI, the remainder being in the NNR. It is perhaps the oldest part of the site, as a continuation of the 100 year old dune ridge is on the eastern side. The lagoon now stays dry for most of the summer months but peak spring tides occasionally fill it with an average depth of some 30/40cm. At these times the number of birds feeding and roosting substantially increase.
Vegetation at the northern end continues to slowly expand.
The western edge of the lagoon runs along Seacroft Esplanade, where residents have for many years dumped their garden rubbish. There are now many garden escapees that have established themselves as a direct result of this activity together with a number of deliberate plantings by residents, presumably to enhance their view. Some of these are invasive such as Snowberry and Russian Vine and must be controlled.
Reed Bed
A new habitat has naturally developed over the last 6/7 years and although relatively small at present (with a spread of some 50x10 meters) has the potential to substantially increase in coming years. It is located just to the east of Drake Road access point and consists of reed (phragmites) and rush (scirpus). The area is on the edge of a tidal creek, forming a small lagoon area which tends to collect rainwater.
Several dead water shrews (predated) have been found fairly close to this area.
