The Autistic Naturalist: Jan 22nd Minsmere

Monday 22 January 2018

Jan 22nd Minsmere

Feeders at Minsmere

It was not a great journey to Minsmere this morning. Traffic heading out of Norwich was slow and it took some time until we were into the countryside. On top of that, there was also a detour getting to Minsmere due to a flooded road. When we eventually arrived to the former Springwatch base, we had been on the road for two hours! And was it worth the trouble getting here? Not really. There was a glossy ibis about, but it was just outside the main reserve in an area we were unfamiliar with and we decided to give it a miss. A glaucous gull was reported on the beach, but that was now gone by the time we turned up. We ended up seeing very little. It was not a good day.

Grey Squirrel

Cormorants

Though it was a rather disappointing outing at Minsmere today, we did see a few things, just nothing spectacular as an otter or a bittern. From Island Mere Hide, there were cormorants, mute swans, a few gulls and mallards and marsh harriers annoying the local corvid population. A flock of long-tailed tits followed us around along the woodland trail, searching every branch and surface of bark of the trunks of every tree we pass. Bittern Hide only had marsh harriers to offer and a lot of bright sunlight shining in my face. And finally, at East Hide, the scrapes were flooded and didn't have that much about on it besides wigeon, a few teal, mallards, gadwall, shelduck and 3 pintails (2 males and one female), 5-7 distant marsh harriers in the air at once in the horizon, while out at sea, we saw a red-throated diver which was too far away to photograph. So not exactly the most productive of days at Minsmere, but at least I saw something, just nothing redeemable for the bad trip getting here.