The last couple of days has certainly seen a chill in the wind here on the Sands and accordingly it seems that the birds are reacting to the onward march of Autumn into Winter. For me its always the Whooper swan passage at this time of year that makes it particularly special and they are certainly not disappointing with small and large herds passing south towards their main wintering ground in East Anglia.
Yesterday there was a single bird in the recently cropped sugar beet, it seemed pretty tired but it also may have been that it was so full of the sweet stuff it couldn't be too bothered to fly far! But this morning there were four beautiful whoopers together almost in the same location but also hoovering up the sugar beet alongside the greylag geese. They gave some lovely views and even a few little whoops just to brighten up the morning.
Here's a few shots of what are possibly my favourite swan.
Its certainly been a good few days birding with this morning being quite productive and with a great range of species that indicated our wetland bird numbers are growing day by day as the weather cools while there is still a passage of smaller birds through the reserve.
Wader wise there has been up to 350 lapwings on Ousefleet and a awesome flock of 3000 golden plover often over the Humber, add in up to 3 spotted redshank, 14 ruff, 22 black-tailed godwit, 19 dunlin, green sandpiper, curlew, redshank, snipe and a jack snipe reported by visitors yesterday then its a great late late wader show.
Snipe, singleton
Ruff
Spotted redshank
Black-tailed godwit
Duck too are starting to build nicely with a few pintail from time to time among the many teal, 66 shoveler was notable this morning among the mallard, gadwall, and shelduck. There is an odd shelduck about at the moment which is a cross with another species of shelduck or duck sp, maybe ruddy shelduck or Egyptian goose? Still a few pink footed geese over site and sometimes feeding in fields nearby. There are still a few little egrets about and a great white reported yesterday passing Swinefleet as it flew towards the Humber, and still a few water rails showing particularly at Singleton.
Pintail - Xerox
A Shelduck allsorts
A lovely rustic coloured wigeon still to wear into its winter plumage
Plenty of bird of prey interest with up to ten marsh harrier coming in regularly to roost, after a bit of research it probably seems likely that the increase in numbers I reported on last week were birds that had for some reason been disturbed from our refuge area in the middle of the Humber at Whitton Island. The hen harrier is seen on and off but can be elusive at the moment while over the weekend there was short eared-owl and barn owl. Merlins are still regular as are peregrines, buzzard, kestrel and sparrowhawk.
Marsh harriers
There has been a nice selection of little bods (a local term used by some of the older folk - honest!), about with regular water pipit around the lagoons (although as usual elusive - listen out for the wist-wist call), kingfisher, and stonechats, yesterday there was also the first grey wagtail for a while. After the initial rush there is just a steady trickle of winter thrushes passing through with both redwing and fieldfare daily, a few more redpolls now passing south among the chaffinch and siskin. Cettis warblers are still singing well and on the calmer mornings still a few bearded tits irrupting.
A lovely redwing from the weekend
Kingfisher on her regular post at Xerox
Grey heron on Ousefleet
Mammals have been good with regular stoat, a very silver fox on Ousefleet, and good numbers of roe deer around the lagoons.
Silver fox
Stoat finding a scent trail on the path
This morning there was a nice little ring of fungi in the borrow ditch as you walk onto the reserve in an area that should be underwater - we are still lacking enough rain to keep the wetland wet but with strong Northerly winds forecast for the weekend it may be an interesting high tide even though its only a 6m peak
Don't step into the fairy ring!