Staying local

Lade  - warm, dry and sunny, light airs - A cracking morning with broken sunshine and hardly a breath of wind, ideal conditions for checking out the local patch. Virtually the first bird we saw was a Short-eared Owl flushed from cover by a spaniel, which then headed out over the desert and dropped down again onto a grassy ridge. Marsh Harriers and Kestrels were most apparent behind the `mirrors` plus a single Buzzard. The roosting Curlew flock was difficult to count but probably around 300 strong.
South lake was crammed full of even more waterfowl that normal, mainly due to the activities of a fisherman on north lake cruising around in an electric boat disturbing everything. I don't suppose it`ll be long before there`s an incident of sorts over here; a couple of weeks ago it was canoeists, today fishermen, none of them wearing life jackets.
A large passerine flock moved through the willow swamp included at least 18 Long-tailed Tits, several Goldcrests and Chiffchaffs, plus a Great Spotted Woodpecker, Kingfisher, Cetti`s Warbler and Water Rail nearby. There was still plenty of Linnets and Goldfinches around and 2 Redpolls flew south calling.

                               Lade north

On a falling tide we checked the beach where eight species of waders were present plus hundreds of gulls, mainly Black-headed, plus 3 Meds and 2 Little Gulls, 5 Brent Geese and a Shelduck.
This evening with a glorious sunset in the offing I couldn`t resist another look for Short-eared Owls of which there were two quartering Mockmill, while hundreds of corvids flew to roost along with several Marsh Harriers.