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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Fozzybear" data-source="post: 1857214" data-attributes="member: 69297">Where did I get to...Thursday 17th JuneWe got up at 2am to walk the mile and a half to Wiveton Downs where my brother hoped he might be able to take some photos of the starry sky and maybe hear some owls. We thought it 'could' be the kind of place you might possibly find Nightjars but hadn't seen any mention of the place in connection to them so doubted it but thought it worth a look... you never know. We got to the Downs a little after 3am and although the sky was a bit cloudy and lightening slightly already my brother stopped at the gate on Saxlingham Road to set up his tripod to have a go at a shot of the sky. While he did that I was listening to the beginnings of the dawn chorus and straining my ears I thought I could hear a very very distant buzzing sound. My brother thought it was probably a power transformer somewhere as I don't have very good hearing and he couldn't hear it when he came to the gate to listen. We walked through onto the western part of the Downs where a pair of Song Thrushes had started a song duel but when they stopped singing we could hear the noise more clearly, a definite chirring of Nightjars! Quietly but quickly with excitement we walked through the darkness, just enough light from the sky to see the outline of the track as we headed to the east side of the Downs where the noise was coming from. Crossing the road and fighting our way as noiselessly as possible through the little path choked with bracken and gorse into the downs car park the chirring became very loud, seemingly emerging from somewhere in a large hollow beside the car park. Then as we approached a second bird started chirring from the trees nearby and we carefully moved to stand behind a large gorse bush, getting out our cameras to record in video so we could get the sound. While we stood there the loud chirring ahead of us stopped and as we stood there listening intently a Nightjar flew up out of the very bush we were standing behind! It circled around us and flew to the trees behind us where it started chirring again, leaving us dumbstruck. To hear one was more than we hoped, to hear two calling and then see one fly right in front of us was just incredible! My brother even had his camera pointing that was so on his recording got a rather dingy silhouette of the bird as it flew up from the bush... plus as he swung it around I was just visible standing with my mouth wide open in amazement. :eek!: :-OWe stood there some time longer but as the sky began to brighten a little the Nightjars fell silent and the other birds began to take over - Wrens, Robins, Blackbirds, a Cuckoo somewhere to the north, Yellowhammers and then Chiffchaffs, Blackcaps and Whitethroats. We left the Downs and walked north-east along the road to Wiveton, stopping when I spotted two Hares in the road that loped off into a field. Approaching carefully we saw three Hares standing amongst the sugar beet and beyond them a Skylark was sitting on top of a beet and as we walked on it began singing from its low perch, giving us a wonderful view. At Wiveton we stopped at the bridge over the river Glaven to sit quietly for fifteen minutes or so, Whitethroats and Blackcaps singing in the brambles and Swallows zipping about over the water. My brother spotted a hole in the bank, a rather Water Vole-like little hole, and a pair of Pheasants wandered around in the meadow and clumsily flew across the river nearby, the male looking as though he only just made the leap! We walked back to the cottage along the Blakeney Road, passing the field where last summer a Marsh Harrier had been harrying a flock of woodpigeons and flew low over our heads, arriving back at the cottage around seven am. A couple of cups of strong coffee, some breakfast and a good long rest and nap on the sofas took us through to the afternoon when we just took a gentle wander around the village and went into the White Horse for a drink... the night-time wandering coupled with the other very early starts and late nights that week had taken its toll and we were rather too bleary to do much else...</blockquote>

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