Westport Lake - Sabine's spectacular

Westport Lake is only 40 miles from Shrewsbury and with the traffic chaos caused by various roadworks, was I glad it was a Sunday!

Even better, this mega-gorgeous juvenile Sabine's Gull actually stayed put - when I got there it was sat down on the shingle shore of the adjacent 'duck pond'.

Despite the attentions of a rather irritating 'photographer' who did his best to flush it, a fairly constant gallery of 30 or so Birders kept their distance (including me!!) and enjoyed, what was for for most, an inland tick and for me another Gull lifer!!






It eventually flew to the main lake and despite more harrassment from local Black heads, fed on surface insects and off during the afternoon.









A brief rest, then it was off again. The light was pretty poor but at least it stayed dry. These latter shots were with the 300mm f2.8 taken from a fishermans pitch ringed by trees - small angle of view and very difficult to lock focus as it flew by but the Gull was flying to within 20 metres or so!!!












Footnote - anyone giving the bird another 24 hours was doomed to miss out - it disappeared overnight!!!

Venus Pool - Invasion of the Terns!!

A 'quick half hour' look at Venus Pool as sometimes happens, turned into a half morning affair. There were no waders but the low cloud and forecast of stormy weather was promising...

First bit of action was at 9.30 when a lone Tern flew in. Hugging the far bank it was not easy to see detail but with an obvious black bill (which I still think looks long!) and legs, optimism got the better of me - something special?? but any Tern is always welcome at VP! I'd realised by the time Andy got there and the pictures show it was a juvenile Arctic Tern (even sporting a metal ring)!
















At least having got Andy there, he was able to enjoy the party of 14 Common Terns which dropped in an hour later, circling over the pool for 2 to 3 minutes - quite a sight! Sad thing was they took the Arctic with them on departure!!

And sorry, no I couldn't get them all in one picture!








A Black headed Gull acting as 'fighter escort' and shadowing them off the reserve!






I left mid-morning with the reported 'probable' juvenile Sabines Gull at Westport Lake near Stoke now a 'definite'!! Hmm, only 40 miles - tempting...........

(You might want to come back and see what happened!)

Venus Pool - flying fish!!!

Not a lot had changed at VP, the two Dunlin were still on the main island. It had to be another session trying to catch flying fish with the Little Egret in front of the Memorial hide.....











The challenge was then trying to get some of these amazing droplets frozen during the action......










Of course, it doesn't always go to plan - here are a couple of bloopers or outtakes!








A Cormorant was in on the act but this is a much more difficult shot to capture- that fish is gone the moment the birds breaks the surface (my favourite so far!!!)






Great Egret, great fish action, great day!

The Mere - Great White hunt

A Shropshire Saturday spent with Yvonne trying to get a decent pic of that Great white Egret (for me) and a tick (for her). The bird report services were buzzing as we left VP (where a couple of Dunlin, Green Sandpiper and Little Egret were all of note).






A Peregrine was perched over the road between Cross Houses and Atcham, a good omen if ever I saw one.....






The Egret was not obvious at the Mere, the usual haunt on the far bank was unproductive as was a scan of the southern end! So, a quick check of Wood Lane at least turned up trumps - a Ruff!! This was 2008 Shropshire bird no 160 for me and my year target reached! It's still August as well - could 170 be on?? I'll just keep going and see what turns up.....






A return to the Mere and realising that the jetty was the place to be, we got the desired result - Egret clearly visible amongst Mereside branches at the Southern end!








The day then got interesting, mainly cos I had the somewhat crazy idea of joining the Mere 'pelagic' and seeing if we could get closer?






Of course, we couldn't get a lot closer and once I'd sold the idea to the skipper to try, guess what - we ran aground!! No problem though, a few pushes - punt fashion and we were off. These images were the best I could do, at least the angle was different (only the left leg was clearly in view, confirming that obvious yellow ring).....








Once ashore, and another walk, it was so ironic when we realised an even closer view was possible from the bank!!! There were so many branches in the way, a clear shot seemed impossible, but now the colour rings were visible and the right leg sported not two but THREE rings - pale green, orange and a much smaller grey possibly metal ring??










Here's an enhanced close up view.....






Its not every day a birding trip includes a pleasure cruise and I guess it might be a very long time before another one - so, back to VP and ???.....

VP and The Mere - Egrets galore!!

Following that 'Heron' episode, I know there's a lot of people dropping into the blog. Excuse the low quality of this posting but it was quite a special Shropshire day and a 'mega' dropped into Shropshire!!

It all started at lunchtime with the VP Little Egret being joined by an interloper. Here's the moment it kicked off......






The handbags came out and it was quite amusing to watch the 'local' bird chasing the newcomer for ten minutes or so until having worn each other out, they decided to settle for an island each!












Not another fish shot!!







The real excitement came as I was leaving work! A Great white Egret reported at Ellesmere - yet another outstanding bird for the County! Needless to say I was off like a shot and a small gathering were toasting a new tick for just about everybody!! The Mere is at least 400m across so don't expect feather detail from these shots but you can see the bill, stature and when flushed by a Heron there was no doubting who was the bigger bird!












Even better, the Egret went out of view for a while, so we all split up to find it again. Prompted by Andy (nice one), what should be over at Whitemere - a juv Arctic Tern!! I've been putting in some hours for a local one of these, job now done - taking the 2008 Shropshire list to a heady 159. So, one off my target for the year which will now be a formality, who knows what the final tally will be - with Autumn passage to come......

And finally, here's the happy bunch of Shropshire birders, smiles all round - even Jason who suffered the agony of a near dip - nearly finding two!! Andy appears to be in congratulatory mood......

Venus pool - catching up....

OK, not exactly cute but nice appealing pictures to catch up. A Green Sandpiper post bathing and Willow Warbler from Friday.....








Whilst I was preoccupied with 'that' Heron on Sunday, this Green Sandpiper was maybe the star bird - close bird, great light, just a shame it was often tucked under the bank (some folk are never pleased?!!)