Highley colourful Mandarin

A walk downstream of Highley with Yvonne didn't take long to produce a pair of Mandarin. In total 4 males and 2 females were seen.

Setting the scene....



Have rock will pose!





And then once it was clear I posed no threat, time for a preen!



Taking the weight of ones feet (one by one)



And a stretch!



Homing in on another female across the river, they love these tangled branch laden habitats





Closer still!

Chelmarsh - Rock Pipit :-)

Martyn Owen and Chelmarsh continue to deliver the goods and news of a late afternoon 'find' saw me dashing straight from work for a really difficult inland bird - Rock Pipit no less and hoping it would stick?

It did but sadly not for long! I got there just before 6.00 and located it on the dam wall with Rob / Ann Stokes the only other birders able to make it before .... at 6.10 the Pied Wagtails with which it was associating, decided to fly off! It tagged along sadly, flying South and didn't appear to be looking back.....

Nevertheless I'd managed a couple of (strictly) record shots and yet another Shropshire lifer!!










Erm, how about a Water Pipit next week please Martyn? I sense a Diver or two this Winter or maybe a long overdue Slav as well the way Chel is performing? We shall see....

Day ONE from Norfolk pics are now uploaded down below too - keep checking back - theres a few days work there :-)

Solitary confinement

I was just getting over a loooooooooonnnnng zzzzzzzzzzzzz and after six days of morn to dusk birding in Norfolk was looking to a 'recovery' day! That is, until Andy Latham called me to say "Solitary Sand in Lancs"!

There's not a lot of point in extending the write up as I've got stacks of things to do except to say...... we went, we saw, we ticked and that was about it! The bird was over 100m distant and clearly the real deal. Fair play to the finder, doing a random duck count and identifying this from such distance! A good grip back after the Devon dip of last November too :-) I even thought I'd got some record shots after watching it perform on 'live view' set at 10x for quite a while - sucker!!

We even encountered that strange moist substance that falls from the sky and unless we get some soon, Venus Pool will be fondly known as Venus Hollow......

Anyway, back to those stacks of things to do! I've got many many Gbs of images from Norfolk and given the number of talks I have to do, I'll have to phase these in over the next couple of weeks - watch this space (below) Oh and I'd better not forget the Covenham American Black Tern!

Here are a few tasters of Norfolk where there was not a rarity in sight (for me anyway). Norfolk however, still turns up plenty of good birds which I'm not likely to see in Shropshire and some amazing moments to capture, like these......

(Keep checking back to see more!)

Cley waders aplenty, including Dunlin (and spot the Little Stint).....



Spot the Little Stints!



A male Ruff that stood out from the crowd....



Marsh Harriers practising their passing skill....



A tantalising view of this outrageous example of bird decadence!



Or this real surprise at a private site (please don't ask)....



It's not all about birds - this Plaice had certainly had it's chips!



Knot much room on this Titchwell Mussel bed.....



A surprise in store under every stone!



Unexpected encounter from the beach!!



As was this Arctic Skua.....



Duelling Barwits!



Contender for Bird of the trip?



A final session with these beauties!



Much much more to come......

Norfolk Day 5

My final day and I chose to return to Titchwell, teaming up Deano again.... A couple of Arctic Skuas were giving the Terns a hard time!








Grounded!



The day was all about wader action though, starting with Common Redshank....



Then getting up close and personal with the source of nutrition!



A tiny crab for this Turnstone.....



After being initially mussel bound.....





The Knot turned their attention to the various invertebrates lurking near the surface of the freshly uncovered sand....









Sanderling followed suit!





Cruising just offshore was this juv Red-throated Diver....



The walk back along the sea wall finally gave an opportunity to capture some Beardie action! Starting with the females.....







Then a dapper male......





Don't they make a lovely couple?



Perhaps the most captivating piece of action of the day was when this Grey Seal surfaced just offshore. Cuddly and sweet? I think not!

A Plaice was about to be lunch and methodically skinned and eaten......









A final wrestle to tear the last morsel of flesh free....



I've spared you some of the more gory action :-)