Country diary: There’s a seaweed party going on on the storm beach | Tim Earl

Castletown Bay, Isle of Man: The smell is unpleasant, but these slimy mounds are full of flies, molluscs and sand hoppers – all vital winter food My British Trust for Ornithology wetland bird survey includes patrolling a storm beach, which, at this time of year, has huge piles of rotting wrack thrown up by the gales. They’re made up of hand-like fronds of laminaria, bladderwrack with its buoyant bubble vesicles, sugar kelp and the long “washing line” strands of non-native sargassum seaweed that arrived from Japan on Pacific oysters and ships’ hulls in recent years. These slimy, smelly heaps are generally unpopular with passersby – some even call for their removal – but for wildlife they are a food source of the highest quality.