Sep 6th Strumpshaw Fen

It was a much improved day at Strumpshaw today. Not only is it not raining, though a little breezy, my camera also behaved itself. No lens malfunctioning at all this morning. I was happy clicking away with no problem what so ever. I hope it stays like that.



Chinese Water Deer

Before my shift began, I went to Fen Hide for about an hour and a half. When I got there, there were a few early visitors inside waiting for something to show up. It was pretty quiet while they were there with me, though I did see a water rail briefly fly to cover and a snipe sitting tight amongst a bank of reeds, but as soon as they slowly left one by one, leaving me in the hide alone, things started appearing. First, a Chinese water deer poked it's head from the reed bed close to the hide to my left and was joined by it's fawn following behind it. The mother cautiously walked closer to the front of the hide. Knowing that I'm inside it, the deer made a short run past the hide to the opposite side. It was then baby's turn and it did the same little run past the hide's front as it's mother did a minute earlier. After a short session of grooming and feeding, they slowly wandered out of sight into the reed bed to my right.

With baby!

Snipe



Kingfisher

Next, I saw two kingfishers flash by with one of them staying after chasing the other away. It hovered in the air before plunging down into the water successfully catching a fish. It was a roach and seemed a bit big for the kingfisher to handle, but it still brought it to the perching branch right in front of me and started bashing it against the perch to kill this wiggling fish in it's bill. It left, but it seemed it wasn't convinced that it was really dead and came back for a second bashing session. I got plenty of great shots, but by the end of this ordeal, the fish was starting to lose scales and the kingfisher ended up leaving with it impaled and stuck to the side of it's bill and hanging over one eye. I also saw a heron, two mute swans and Cobber the black swan in hot pursuit. Then everything went quiet as someone else entered the hide, though I caused the Chinese water deer to run back to the front of the hide as I was leaving.

Grey Heron

Mute Swan

Cobber the Black Swan



Common Lizards

On the way back to Reception Hide, the Sandy Wall wooden borders were dotted with lizards basking in the autumnal sun. In some sections, I managed to spot up to three of these reptiles together in one spot at one point. Someone later came back telling me that they counted over 30 of them during their walk this morning. It was a good day if you were a lizard it seems.

Knopper Gall

Another kind of gall

Guilder Rose berries

Hop

Common Darter



Gadwall

At Reception Hide, it was a bit quiet and with the wind blowing in the direction of the hide, it was a bit cold and there was a strange smell blowing in. The smell was slightly off putting and I can best describe it as like an appliance overheating slightly. Apparently, this might be caused by a chemical reaction of salt water mixing into peat. What ever the cause was, it was not the most pleasant, but not the worst smell I've ever smelt. Bad smells aside, I managed to see plenty of gadwalls looking at their best once again, house martins, a buzzard, a marsh harrier with green tags and the letters VH on it, a few fleeting glimpses of bearded tits as well as several kingfisher appearances, including one involving being chased by black-headed gulls.

Marsh Harrier

Buzzard