Dog days

Lade - 0600hrs  - warm, dry and sunny, sw 3 - Plenty of activity over the pits with loads of extra wildfowl and gulls on south lake, presumably due to a mass insect hatch amongst the surface water weed. Two Common Sandpipers flitted over the water and a couple of Mipits headed south.
Barney got the No 1 treatment from Mrs PT`s clippers the other day as the old boy was suffering in the heat, although I still cannot entice him in for a swim...
RSPB - Called in throughout the day where the only waders I could find were the two Black-wits at the south end of ARC and a Common Sandpiper on Burrowes, plus a few Lapwings and Oystercatchers, although duck numbers were on the rise on both lakes.
Lade - An evening walk along the beach in glorious sunshine was notable for hundreds of gulls pouring back onto the mudflats to feed as the tide receded, along with a number of Sandwich Terns.
Here`s a thought though, I am constantly amazed at how few locals use this fabulous beach - just why is that? You would think that it would be full of kids paddling and mucking about in the sand or playing footie, but no, there was not a single juvenile human to be seen. So where are they all? I see `em getting off the bus, or being shepherded home in mummies car (oops, I`m beginning to sound old...), so they`re definitely hereabouts, just can`t image what they get up too... can you?

                               "Its too damn hot, even with me coat missing"

                                Lade Bay on a glorious July evening

NB: Anyhow, a couple of footnotes, first off many thanks to one and all who pulled over with offers of help as my car expired on the Lydd Road yesterday. It was pretty spectacular (and expensive)as any of you will appreciate if you`ve ever had a turbo diesel engine seize - I really thought it was going to blow up!
Secondly, that blessed unidentified tree up near Park Wood that I posted a while back. I`m now pretty sure after an e-mail from Bill Mclay, who directed me to a spot on pic of it on the internet, that it was a Silver-variegated Norway Maple, Acer platanoides, drummondii. I kid you not, that tree has been more problematic than a phylloscopus warbler in moult!