Submerged

 Nov 6th Strumpshaw Fen

I was in for a surprise when I neared Strumpshaw this morning. As I was making my way from Brundall station, I was just a few hundred yards or so from the reserve when I noticed a lot of water seeping across the road just before the car park entrance. Luckily, the raised centre of the road made it shallower than either side and I was able to walk through it, though a jeep did pressure me from behind while I was midway through. 

The reserve itself was just as bad. The pond behind the feeder area was up to the seat of the bench next to it, the broad outside Reception Hide was up to the hide's wall, both Fen and Tower hides were inaccessible as water covered the paths leading to them and there was a section of Sandy Wall where water was seeping under the wooden borders that were meant to keep the floods out. Even the sand cliff area (which is not even close to anywhere with water) was like a large pond. The only places left that were unaffected by the floods were the paths leading to the pumphouse, the path from pumphouse to the woods and the entire woodland trail.

My investigation of the flood took up most of my time during my pre-shift walk. I was more concerned about the path conditions than to look for wildlife. But once I was away from the floods, it felt more like a normal walk. I used my Merlin app to record the birds and it picked up a flock of crossbills and a few lesser redpolls. Not sure how accurate the app's ID was and I didn't really get to see them to confirm it. I also spooked a hare twice as I was walking back to the Reception Hide.

The view from Reception Hide was rather empty for the most part. It took most of the morning until about 20 mallards decided to show up. There was also marsh harriers, buzzards, a red kite and a great white egret flying over in the distance, but that was about as exciting as it got.

Flood (Nov 6th), Snow Bunting
& Curlew (Nov 11th), Rainbow (Nov 13th)
Whooper Swans & Starling Murmuration (Nov 20th)

Nov 11th Cley

It was a bit disappointing for this month's visit to Cley. Though there was a kestrel by the visitor centre, the reserve itself was very quiet. The pools produced mainly ducks in the form of teal, shovelers, wigeon and shelducks with a small number of dunlin, black-tailed godwits and gulls (mostly black-headed gulls), 2 avocets, the odd marsh harrier, a little egret, some mute swans, 4-6 brent geese and one pink-footed goose flying over. The best highlight was on the beach with 8-10 snow buntings on the shingled embankment. I also had close views of curlew and a couple of pintails can be seen from the East Bank.

Nov 13th Strumpshaw Fen

A really horrible morning, but improved by midday. I got soaked walking along the river looking for the red-throated diver that had been seen for the past week or so, but not today. On a positive note, at least the floods receded.

There were rainbows showing from Reception Hide, but other than marsh harriers, buzzards, a great white egret, a few mallards and 7 swans, that was about it. By the end of my shift, the rain had been replaced by very strong winds.

Nov 20th Strumpshaw Fen

It was a nice day for once and I brought my brand new bridge camera with me to try it out. I went for a walk with Liz Dack (a Strumpshaw regular) to the pumphouse and found a chiffchaff in one of the trees along the river. We also had fieldfares, redwings, a nuthatch, a treecreeper and some interesting fungi in the woods. At Reception, it was another quiet day, though I did see an otter, marsh harriers, a heron (briefly), some mallards, greylags and a couple of gadwall.

After my shift, I went to Tower Hide to check out a male goosander that had been reported during the morning. Once I navigated the mud and got to the hide, I could not find it. However, I was surprised to see that there were four whooper swans instead. I've never seen these birds actually on the reserve before. They usually just fly over. I also found a lizard basking in the November sun along Sandy Wall as well as a few common darters and red admirals which are also making the most of this unusually warm day for this time of year.

Returning back to the Reception Hide, I waited for dusk and for the starlings to arrive to roost. It took until around 3:30pm for them to really get going. A few visitors stayed on to watch the spectacle with me as the small number of starlings grew with every minute as they swirled around the broad. In the end, I estimated that 5-6 thousand birds and they were still arriving after the main group poured into the reedbeds in front of the hide. Sparrowhawks and marsh harriers flew in to try and grab one from the reeds for an easy meal as the light continued to fade.

This ended up being my last outing of the month as the weather turned awful and at Strumpshaw, there was a huge high tide and the river flooded again. This time, it was really bad. The reserve closed completely and I made the decision to skip my final shift of the month. It just wasn't worth it. It was raining anyway. Torrential rain. I doubt I'd see any birds at all.