Going for gold !

Having joined the ever swelling rank and file at St Marys over the last couple of mornings listening to the calls of Yellow Brow over here right at the back of that thicket, not being so nimble afoot these days (unlike Cain and Phil ) I have to admit to not having the pleasure of the YBW yet.

These two Goldcrests were a bit more obliging and look rather dapper considering the weather the last few days.

Plenty of Redstarts about too

These guys always seemed to be active even when other things were a bit slow.

And finally the Brambling my first this year but Cain and Phil counted five, all nice to see and a very enjoyable couple of mornings.

Whooper & Rail

A slow wander down the pond on this bright sunny morning ,calling at the members hide first and managing a one shot chance of this Water rail before it heard the click of the camera and legged it back into the reeds,I was quite surprised to catch it out in the open.

Back on the track and peering into the top feeding station which appears to have been taken over by a Brown rat explosion,six at first glance and I am sure there's more now that the fields been harvested,continuing down to the public hide I looked out onto a sea of Gulls all having a wash and brush up whilst waiting for the tractor to continue ploughing in the fields to the rear,just as I was about to leave this rather smart adult Whooper Swan dropped in but was soon harassed by the resident Mute Swan a very nice morning stroll.

PS
     Tuck your trouser bottoms in lads these rats are everywhere!!.

Great Skua

A quiet couple of hours in the hide at Holywell came to an abrupt end with a shout from Simon of Skua coming in from the east and landing at the opposite end of the pond to the hide,after a short while it lifted and made its way towards us.

It then decided to go for this Coot catching it quite unawares and proceeded to kill it by drowning

this was a case of seconds to live !!

we saw no more of the Coot and the Skua didn't eat it either, as all this action was taking place a strange thing happened the Little Grebes started to gather encircling  the Skua two and three at fist then six and seven ending up with eighteen before the Skua took off and headed n/east (Quite a strange thing to witness)
and could this be the same bird that's been hanging around Cresswell ??.

PS
Have just read PC Wanderings Skua'd
the Bonxie was on Holywell pond from 2-25pm untill 2-45 pm time reported on Birdguides was inaccurate due to the fact my phone clock was five mins fast which I didn't discover until later.
Hope this clears up any misunderstanding.

Evening on the Pond

A couple of nights ago I was at the corner of the cattle field at Holywell watching two SEOs having a bit of a tussle with three Crows,one of the owls broke off the engagement quite soon and flew off, the other owl just kept going higher and higher followed by the crows each one of the Crows would peel off in turn as the Owl kept gaining height until it was just a blip,I found this quite fascinating as I had never seen Owls go to such heights before.Today I thought I would try for a photo of the owls arriving a bit soon I called in the hide to kill time and caught this fisherman trying for his supper!.

Time was getting on as I made my way to an area where I had seen a Owl land on a post in a previous visit to my surprise it was already there on the post which didn't give me anytime to get set up,the light had faded quite quickly and the bird was in the shady area of the field margin the camera seemed to struggle to focus as I upped the Iso to 3200  and a 20 sec at f6.3  700mm resting on a fence post this was my best effort after a lot of tidying up and sharpening !!.

Cley Marshes

Returning from our trip to Minsmere we stopped of at Cley for a look,the information board outside the centre said a Sacred Ibis had been seen the day before so we thought we would give it a go.The field where the Ibis had been seen the day before only produced this Egyptian Goose.

Further round by one of the pools we came across this Little Egret about to have its breakfast and looking very dapper,but still no Ibis !.

We were about to give up on the Ibis when word came through that it had been spotted in a field about half a mile from the reserve trouble was it was alongside a busy narrow road with no parking,the only thing to do if I wanted to see it was to take life in our hands and carry the gear along which was a bit of a struggle to say the least eventually we came across a black and white dot hiding in the only patch of thistles in the field.

 Good views were not going to be had from this shy and distant bird,just then it decided to surprise us both by taking flight here's a couple of panicky B I F s .