Arrived Walsey Hills carpark at 9.10am
Lovely sunny day and BF Reader (John) also parked in the carpark! - nice to see you again.
Walked round Walsey Hills -
1 Cettis Warbler singing, snipe drumming, an
Adder basking on bank with his red eye glinting in the sunshine! Several blue tits, great tits and chaffinches in the scrub, a large flock of yellow hammers, greenfinches and linnets round the back fields. Meadow pipits and skylarks, several blackbirds and robins. Along the back ridge a long tailed tit, marsh harrier, a
2nd Cettis Warbler and 2 red leg partridge in bottom field.
Pete (Vol. Warden) then arrived, had a quick chat then I went off along the
East Bank to find the Shorelark, which I was reluctant to do at this point as Pete was 'going for a look round' which mean't he would probably see something good, but promised he would ring if he did! Anyway I went along the East Bank and about half way along a lapwing stood on the bank extremely close to me and was pulling out worms! it was very odd as I have never seen one that close and then something really funny happened - one of the worms he pulled out got flung around the back of his neck and he couldn't get hold of it! - he then flew off with the worm still around him! Usual birds on the marshes, avocets, brents, several ringed plover etc etc. Walked east at end of bank and had to walk quite a way before I had distance views of the Shorelark and then a photographer flushed them over my head and directly in front of me - had fantastic views of
3 Shorelarks (11.25am) at the top of the ridge in the sunshine! Pete then called me to tell me to look straight on to the marsh to look at 2 sandwich terns - I couldn't see them at all, plus having no scope did not help.
BF HelenElizabeth was also there with someone else and they couldn't see them either. When I got to the end of East Bank I diverted to NWT Centre to 'ladies' and was going to treat myself to something yummy from cafe, but when I saw £2.20 for a cheese scone I changed my mind! On the fields east of the centre there were several lapwing and goldenplover feeding. A man I spoke to there had seen a swallow going west and a common buzzard earlier. Walked back to Walsey Hills to find out Pete had also had a swallow!!!! typical, knew I should have stayed there! Sat on a deck chair eating my lunch and the sun had now gone in and it felt quite chilly! I then had a very easy find:-O while munching on a bar of chocolate sitting in deck chair I suddenly spotted something interesting moving about in the gorse just to left of the steps, it was a
Firecrest!!! (1.20pm) Pete was very pleased as it was his first of the spring (I have already seen one) - but I got told off for finding it on his patch
and phoned it through to RBA. A few people came up to try and find it, but we did not see it any more after that.
I left here around 3pm and got to
Titchwell about 4pm to try and see the Black Necked Grebe (ha ha ha). A nice
water rail was in the ditch at beginning of path on right and had my
first Chiffchaff singing round the Fen Trail. Hundreds of Brents about I noticed. Freezing cold now and strong winds. Spoke to warden Paul Eele who had not seen the grebe and I don't think anyone else had for a while either. There were
2 red breasted mergansers and
1 great crested grebe on the sea. Several grey plover and other usual stuff, oystercatchers, gulls etc on the shore. Sand martin and swallow had been seen today by other people. Back along the path a pied wagtail battled in the wind. There seemed to be quite a few carrion crows about aswell, I counted at least 6. Sat in Parrinder hide for a while, nothing special, carried on and sat in the Fen hide to finish off. There was a couple and a man on his own when I went in the hide - there were several marsh harriers coming into roost, I counted 5 - the couple then left and just after the man left, just before 6.30pm a
ringtail Hen Harrier came into view and also my closest ever sighting of a
Peregrine which shot along the front of the hide and then landed briefly on a small bush to left of hide!!! Walked back to carpark and after getting in car and turning lights on I saw a very, very interesting bird (please keep an eye out tomorrow!!!!) it sat in the hedge opposite the loos and the second I put my bins up it disappeared. It was roughly thrush sized, totally pale underneath with a longish tail, I sat there for a while in hope to see it again! As soon as I saw it, I thought that looks interesting! Left here just before 7pm and went and parked opposite Titchwell Manor and stood by field to try and see the White Fronted Goose which was reported earlier, I could just about see some geese the other side of the field, but they could have been anything in that light:-O
Went to mother's for home made cheese scones that didn't cost £2.20!!!
Best Wishes Penny:girl:
