Feb 27th Strumpshaw Fen

Frosty start to this morning!

A battle of the seasons was happening this morning at Strumpshaw as winter fought spring. In the early morning sun, there was frost on the ground and blossom on the trees. The warmth of the sun was winning it out over winter's cold grip. Warm, bright sunlight merged with icy cold mist across the reserve like a blanket of beauty.

Frosty view from Reception Hide

View from Fen Hide

Great Crested Grebe

It was still slightly cold when I got to the Fen Hide and I didn't fancy staying inside it for long, not that there was much to see besides a Chinese water deer and a quick flash of a kingfisher which did not hang around. So, I decided to walk along the river trail and to Tower Hide. The route to Tower Hide was a lot drier than it has been, though it was a little bit slippery in places but still passable. On the way, a pair of kingfishers had a bit of a dispute as they chased one another over the Accidental Broad. Again, just another brief encounter that lasted mere seconds. Meanwhile, on the river, a pair of great crested grebes were performing a graceful dance of head flicks and mirrored movements.

View from Tower Hide

The Tower Hide side of the reserve seemed more active in bird life than what I could see at the Fen Hide and Reception Hide combined. While black-headed gulls were the most dominant and noisy species here, there were also plenty of court shipping shelducks and sleepy pochards and teal, too.

Shelducks

Pochard

Black-headed Gull

Marsh Harriers

Colts-foot

Dunnock

Greylags take over the Reception Hide's view

Back at Reception Hide, around a hundred greylags took over the broad. The gadwall, shovelers, mallard and 2 pochards were completely outnumbered. Marsh harriers, buzzards and a sparrowhawk circled high above them all in their aerial displays, but the big highlight of the day was when I saw a bittern near the end of my shift, flying low over the geese congregating near the front of the hide from right to left. It then went down into the sliver of remaining reeds bordering the edge of the area of strimmed reed stubble to the hide's left. It popped its head out for a brief moment into the open, but decided to make its way into the thicker section of reeds instead of showing itself to everyone. 

Brimstone

As the morning wore on, the early frost was now a forgotten memory. It was now so warm that butterflies and other insects were emerging from their hiding places. My first butterfly of 2019 was a red admiral and my second, third and many more others were all brimstones. Spring appears to be here to stay, though the weatherman says otherwise. It is apparently going to be much colder and winter-like again in the next few days.

Red Admiral

Early Bumblebee?

Hoverfly

Feb 24th Titchwell

Brambling

It has been an eventful visit to Titchwell today. It was warm and sunny and my parents decided that it was a waste not to make the most of it. So, here I am with my mum and dad enjoying the glorious weather on the North Norfolk coast looking for birds in the process. And we didn't have to go far from the visitor centre until I had my first highlight of the day. Brambling were joining the goldfinches, chaffinches and other common garden birds on the bird feeders. A great start.

Muntjac Deer

We had just joined the main path to begin our walk to the main reserve when a muntjac deer crossed in front of us emerging from one ditch to our right and disappearing to the other ditch to our left. It wasn't in much of a hurry to disappear despite our presence, but it was largely ignored by an adjacent large crowd staring a little further up at the ditch it came out from. Why? Because there was a water rail showing extremely well probing for food in the mud.

Water Rail

Barn Owl

The walk to Island Hide continued to throw more surprises at us. It took many minutes to get to this hide because we had to keep stopping every few yards for one exciting bird after another. Marsh harriers were displaying above us and a small flock of bearded tits was drawing quite a large crowd of people watching them feed on the reed heads along the edge of the freshwater marsh, but for me, seeing a barn owl hunting in broad daylight over the fields and salt marshes on the left side of the main path was without doubt pretty special. It made a couple of flights before plummeting behind a bush and out of sight each time. I managed to get one very distant shot of it. Not the greatest photos, but it will do.

Bearded Tit

Bearded Tit watching

Reed Bunting

Linnet

The three main pools provided a reasonable selection of waders and wildfowl. This included; Mediterranean gulls, avocets, black-tailed godwits, grey plover, oystercatchers, redshanks, shelducks, greylags, a turnstone, curlews, gadwall, teal and brent geese.

Greylag

Shelduck

Oystercatcher

Mediterranean Gull

Black-headed Gull

Grey Plover

Curlew

Black-tailed Godwit

Turnstone

Avocet

Avocets and Godwits

The beach

When I finally got to the beach, the tide was out, but wasn't exposing the seaweed which normally attracts all the waders close enough for me to photograph. Without this exposure, the waders were few and far between along the tideline. The real action was far out at sea, where you really needed a scope to see them properly. I had to ask nicely to a friendly sea watcher to get a look at a very handsome long-tailed duck that kept diving out of view whenever I peered through their scope. It was amongst the distant bodies of goldeneyes and red-breasted mergansers. I also saw a red-throated diver and some cormorants before making the walk back to the visitor centre for lunch. There was still time for one more short walk to the Fen Hide and the blind viewing the pool on the right side of the reserve, seeing tufted ducks and a little grebe, before heading home.

Red-throated Diver

Goldeneye

Tufted Duck

Scarlet Elfcap