It was predictable of course that as soon as I was away a good bird would turn up. It was so good that I was moved to do a remote blog update from deepest darkest Cornwall. Since that wonderful find it's all been depressingly quiet and I've arrived back to find very few sightings posted on Going Birding. The highlights have been 1 OYSTERCATCHER, a peak count of 11 LITTLE EGRETS, 1 GREENSHANK, 1 BARNACLE GOOSE (presumably the usual escapee), 1 COMMON GULL and 1 COMMON SANDPIPER.
This morning I went on a patch-wide run to check out the current state of the area and it was pretty quiet. The floods have all gone and the grass is fast reclaiming the muddy patches. There were plenty of wood pigeons and lapwings dotted over the grass and at what had been Stint Corner there was a congregation of black-headed gulls and a couple of juvenile common terns with more gulls spread out over the surrounding grass so that there must have been several hundred around in total. A lone LITTLE EGRET was up in the Hinterland opposite the poplars and there were at least 6 juvenile YELLOW WAGTAILS in amongst the numerous cattle with more terns hunting over the river.
In Burgess Field there were few butterflies around with a couple of common blues the only points of interest. Until we get some decent flooding, it's going to be rather quiet for a while now I suspect.
Addendum
I forgot to mention that Richard Foster had a fly-over WOOD SANDPIPER. Apparently about 40 minutes earlier one had flown off north from 1066 near Drayton so it may very well have been the same bird.
No comments:
Post a Comment