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Thursday 4 March 2010

We Are Nearly There!

This morning, a few Meadow Pipits and alba Wagtails were heading north up the valley, along with a single Golden Plover over Seaton Marshes...birds are on the move! Mind you, although the sun was shining for most of the day, it really didn't feel like spring with the flipping cold north wind that's been blowing!!!

Yet again the valley was well flooded this morning, and Colyford Common looked like this...

I love it when it's like this!

The Spoonbill was sleeping besides the river and the only other bird worth mentioning here was a Water Pipit on the Common, with a few Rock Pipits. It was a bit too distant for photos, but I still had a go...

At least it's identifiable from these pics....just!

Lower Bruckland Ponds yet again offered Tufted Ducks, and this time it was a pair...

Be nice if they stayed and made baby Tufted Ducks!

Trinty Hill failed to show any Crossbills, it was really windy up here and my visit had to be cut short due to taxiing requirements. A brief stop of at home showed our wintering female Blackcap...

....making the most of a Royal Gala!

I failed to find a Ring-billed Gull this afternoon so had to make do with three Med Gulls...

A smart adult but rather backlit!

A second-winter...VERY backlit!

And the third...can you spot it?? (a first-winter)

Waders on show included the Knot, two Dunlin and 20+ Blackwits, which included a colour-ringed bird. The combination of yellow, red, yellow on one leg confirmed it as one of ours, and on the other leg was green, orange, red (GOR). I think this bird was ringed in October 2008 at Colyford Common, but don't quote me on that.

I did my best to ignore all the
Redshanks, but this one just could not, not be photographed...

Sorry...I promise you won't see another Redshank photo on this blog again for a long time!

Have got to grips with my new Nikon, and am a very happy chappy! Another problem with my old Nikon was that it wouldn't recognise my digital remote clicker when I plugged it in...but this one does :-) I think not having to touch the camera to take a photo will be a mega bonus, it means there will be zero camera shake! Anyway, this is how my setup looks...

It's nice to be digi-scoping again!

I shall finish this post with this photo taken by Sue Smith, I hope you don't mind me posting it on here Sue! She was sat in Colyford Common hide yesterday afternoon...

You don't often get these two species in the same photo!!!

2 comments:

  1. Enjoyed your post. It could have done with a few more Redshank photos though! ;-)

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  2. Hahahaha! Baby Redshanks may well get their pictures taken, but no more adults I'm afraid!!! Hehe!

    ReplyDelete