The year's birding is really starting to heat up at the moment despite the chilly feel with at last the return of a couple of hen harriers, regular merlin, plenty of marsh harriers, peregrine and up to three beautiful barn owls hunting over the reedbed and grassland.
This little beauty was in front of Xerox hide this morning
Merlin on top of one of the bushes
Juvenile peregrine at the kill - I'll be doing a bit of a story board about this bird later in the week
WIth the freeze thaw of the lagoons at the moment the wildfowl are commuting back and forth the river but there are usually a few wigeon, teal, shelduck, wigeon, mallard and gadwall on the lagoons but most spectacular has been the 3000+ pink-footed geese that have at times been feeding next to the reserve or flying over. Good to see so many geese still feeding in the area in January, usually they have mostly left for pastures new. Still a single little egret feeding on First lagoon, not sure how much more food there is in it as the little egret has fed on there every day for the past month!
A few pinkfeet
Still good numbers of lapwings around the area too with over 3000 at the weekend but there is only the odd snipe and redshank feeding around the edges of the lagoons. Curlew continue with their good showing, with birds flying over and at times feeding on the grazing marsh, I always enjoy photographing this quintessential British wader here along the Humber.
Fly over curlew
And a good example of the difference in bill length between male and female - the female has the longer bill
Waders and wildfowl out at our Reads Island refuge near the Humber bridge - don't forget its World Wetlands Day on Saturday!
It seems for the smaller birds winter is biting hard at the moment with almost not a single berry left on site! So just the odd fieldfare, blackbird while the song thrushes seem to be enjoying a bit of snail bashing. There is however still the odd water pipit using the lagoons and a few stonechats braving the chill and a few bearded tits are feeding along the edges of xerox. Also plenty of tree sparrow around the feeders and a few singing cettis warblers around the pathways.
Stonechat on Ousefleet
This morning I had an interesting encounter with a Roe deer up around a frozen Ousefleet flash. So have you ever been out in icy weather and slipped flat on your backside and hoped that no one was watching? Well this poor roe deer seemed to be having difficulty walking on ice with its legs flailing all over the place, when all of a sudden whoomf, it went flat on its posterior and unfortunately for her I was there to capture her embarrassment on photo, oh dear is there no privacy. And just to add it was totally unharmed but looked a little sheepish, if that's the right word?
Wobbling on the ice!
Oops - poor love
Many thanks for the sightings Lawts very much appreciated. I do like it when people interact with the blog and give us a helping hand in getting the sightings out - more please! BTW its been minus 3 here all day today, a real bit of winter.......
Can confirm from photo that last night's Merlin was a male.
Good late on last night with 2 Water Pipits from Singleton. The Merlin buzzing a Marsh Harrier that was sat in the Merlin tree. Merlin then buzzing a Barn Owl in flight, before finally settling in the Merlin tree. Thousands of Pink-feet over towards Alkbrough. A fox walking across the ice from Singleton. Also Buzzard, Sparrowhawk, Little Egret and Snipe.
Just for info with the cold night last night the majority of the lagoons have frozen up with just a smidgen of water left on Marshland lagoon.