In part one of this sequence of blogs I told you how I had spent a wonderful couple of hours at Freiston Shore, and how reading The Biggest Twitch by Ruth Miller and Alan Davies had inspired me to keep a list of everything I saw during the month of August whilst I was trekking around the east coast of England.
Frampton Marshes is Freiston’s big brother. An impressive reserve with several hides, you are usually treated to some excellent views of salt marsh birds. I usually park myself in the 360 hide for the majority of the time I am here, but walking the perimeter of the lagoon has yielded some excellent views of Peregrines and Barn Owls in the past. So I always either begin or end my visit with a circuit of the reserve.
There are a few bird calls that will actually stop you in your tracks and make you look around. A Tawny Owl “tw-it ta-hoo” is one, the Cuckoo is most definitely another. Late July/ early August is unseasonably late to hear them calling. But sure enough one was calling on our arrival from near the visitor centre. Quick checks with the BTO twitter feed confirmed that one of their tagged Cuckoos, Ken, had indeed up from Norfolk to Lincolnshire, and was in the vicinity. It alas remained unseen in the hedgerow. (As an aside two days after hearing Ken he was crossing the border into Spain, migration is as utterly remarkable as the BTO Tracking website!). The hedgerow did yield a Spotted Flycatcher hawking insects from a protruding branch.
The lagoon had a fair smattering of waders on it; the usual suspects were added to the list, including my favourite little water fowl, the Little Grebe. Frampton is always an excellent place to see decent numbers of the elegant Little Egret. It is probably the only place other than Newport Wetlands I see them in such large numbers. Redshanks and Black-Tailed Godwits picked at the water’s edge. My wife seems to have an inbuilt Snipe radar and it wasn’t long before she pointed one out almost perfectly camouflaged against a mud bank. The whole Snipe thing was to become a feature of future visits to Frampton Marshes over the coming weeks, I am not really sure how she does it, but I don’t really complain too loudly. I love watching this long billed wader probing around in the mud looking for food. It is almost comical to see.
The summer bloom of insects meant the skies had plenty of Swallows, House Martins and the occasional Sand Martins performing aerial acrobatics. It was also one of my last chances to see Swifts before they departed back to Africa.
I left feeling quite happy with my morning’s bird watching, the list increased with some birds that would be beginning their migrations soon. A lovely Sunday lunch at local pub added a curious Dunnock who was making the most of a dropped piece of bread under a picnic table. He was soon joined by a Robin and a couple of House Sparrows.
The list was now over forty species and I had only had limited time to bird watch on this visit, as we were in Lincolnshire for family reasons. We were going to be back soon to the East of England, but this time for a holiday, and somewhere I hadn’t been before, Essex. New places to explore inevitably produce new birds to see …
To be continued …
© All Photos Anthony Walton
Another cracker!