Tuesday 7th June: Spoonbill!

I had decided only to do updates to this blog every few days now that we'd reached the June doldrums. However the find of a splendid SPOONBILL at the North end of the floods today has rather put paid to the notion that it's all gone quiet.

After the rain today, this evening was absolutely gorgeous with no wind and a wonderful sunny sky. The rain had freshened up the floods a little and seemed to have cleared some of the green algae from the centre of the flood area. I was not expecting anything particularly interesting and was idly working my way around the floods when I came across the SPOONBILL feeding away in the North Channel. It seemed to be finding plenty of food and was gradually working its way east along the channel. When I left just before 9pm it seemed to have settled in one spot and was tucking its head down so it may well roost there tonight though the chances of it staying any length of time tomorrow are rather small to be honest.

Apart from this star bird there were the five OYSTERCATCHERS again and a couple of LITTLE RINGED PLOVER near Stint Corner. A wonderful start to what is usually a very quiet month for the Meadow.



The spoonbill on the floods this evening (c) Adam Hartley




Some digiscoped shots of the spoonbill (c) Adam Hartley