Its alive! Spring floods brings an amazing bird bounty

Our cup is certainly running over at the moment with yet another massive series of tides and currently most of the reserve paths flooded to above wellington height and therefore closed. However, we have endeavoured to keep the site open as Ousefleet hide is apart from at high tide, open and accessible along the bottom of the flood bank as indicated on the sign at the second entrance gate to the reserve. 

Flooding up! Ousefleet just starting to flood on Tuesday.

And the path to Ousefleet running water through fast - I almost couldn't walk through it, one of the reasons we have to sometimes close completely. 

This is because Ousefleet hide and from the gate has been somewhat spectacular for the waders and ducks particularly at the right time as the flood recedes with waders often feeding right in front of the hide giving some very close up and personal viewing. There's also been some nice surprises too with the first summer migrant in the form of a singing chiffchaff and up to three brent geese yesterday, not a particularly regular goose on the Sands, just remember we are 45 miles inland and brents are a very coastal species.   

Brent goose

What a superb early spring its turning out to be for the waders here on site, not just numbers but fantastic views to boot. I certainly can't remember anything like it and I certainly feel like its been driven by the incredible food abundance brought about by the muck naturally spread by the ponies, sheep and cattle. From what I've been seeing all the waders are scoffing large amounts of small red worms or muck worms as my granddad Short would have called them. 

Redshank with a beak full of worm, no wonder there are so many on site at the moment

With birds often lining up in front of Ousefleet hide there's been plenty to look through with counts of over 200 black-tailed godwits, 68 redshank, 22 avocets, 3 spotted redshank, dunlin, snipe, lapwings and 9 ruff this morning, add in the 100+ curlew from the gate and 4 oystercatchers then Ousefleet has been the place to be (well only place to be in fact since yesterday!).

Redshank and spotted redshank (right hand bird)

Black -tailed godwit

Dunlin - not often you get close to dunlin

And a nice bit of feeding video of dunlin - see if you can count how many food items it eats. I reckon at least 5 including a small worm

Avocets

Feeding ruff, redshank and dunlin

Duck have been pretty good too with plenty of wigeon still on site looking resplendent in their breeding plumage, teal numbers have dropped but there is still a nice mix of shoveler, gadwall, mallard and shelduck, alongside tufted ducks, pochard and two pairs of goldeneye.  However note until the water recedes some of these species may be out of reach. 

Wigeon

Goldeneye

There has also been a lone whooper swan around the lagoons and occasionally on Ousefleet and look out for a few pinkfeet, there were about 28 that dropped onto Whitton Island at the weekend. 

Whooper swan

Pinkfeet on Whitton with Barnacles

Shelduck

The black headed gulls are starting to build up and display

Marsh harriers can still be seen well from Ousefleet and there is still the odd buzzard around while merlin was reported today as well as a flyover raven, still a rare bird on the reserve! Barn owls are still hunting along the bank in the evenings but as the days draw out and warm up they are not quite so active during opening hours. 

This male was nest building this morning despite the surge water in the reedbed

The crows really don't like the buzzards, mainly because they raid the crow nests and eat the young if given a chance

Little egrets have been ultra scarce this winter on the reserve so it was nice to have one feeding at Ousefleet the other day, while last weekend the bittern started to boom with a few grunts heard at dusk before I went off for my tea. 

With all these high tides we've been ensuring that the lagoon sluices can let in a little bit of water so that we can capture the spring run of sticklebacks, shrimp and hopefully elvers. These are vital food for not only our bitterns but also the spoonbills that really rely on the stickleback for food, in Holland they have shown that many of their spoonbills rely on the stickleback migration into their large lagoon systems and will travel as the nesting spoonbills at Fairburn did last year up to 30 miles to collect them. 

Sticklebacks lining up at Marshland sluice for the tide to open the flap valve on the lagoon.

And one of my 'Heath Robinson' elver run pipes running water backwards into the lagoon!

A nice selection of snails on a bit of wood that was floating in the water

When the wind isn't howling the smaller birds are starting to get ready for the breeding season with the Cettis warblers cranking up the volume and showing a little better, still a large group of tardy fieldfares in the field next to the reserve and a few skylarks and returning meadow pipits. At least one water pipit left often flying around in front of Ousefleet and dropping into the reed edge, and the odd stonechat still around the reed fringes, plenty of tree sparrow activity around the nest boxes and great to hear singing chiffchaff, spring is certainly on its way in!  

Stonechat

Tree sparrows inspecting their summer des-res.

I'll finish off with a nice picture of a bullfinch that was part of a large group feeding on Hawthorn buds at one of our other sites along the Humber, such fantastic birds reflecting the rich colours of the British Countryside.

And the koniks keeping down the vegetation on one of the roosting islands with the wind blowing through their tails and manes