After a period of mild or but cloudy weather the feel of spring had started to be felt around the Crook. Skylarks were in full song on many of the past few days and the hawthorn around the site were bursting their buds and the tiny green leaves were starting to show themselves. Possibly the first migrant of the year, a green sandpiper, was flushed from the newly created wetland features.
However, the main bird interest is still wintery in nature, Pink-footed and Barnacle Geese are now gathering on the reserve and in the nearby fields feeding feverishly in preparation of their long flight northwards in the next few weeks. the constant cackling remining us that winter is not quite over yet. Occasionally the whoop of the whooper swans are heard overhead as they whirl around in the evening to roost on one of the lagoons on the reserve. Then this week the weather also reminds us that even if it is meteorological spring the winter has still something to add to the discussion. The skies cleared, the winter came from the north and the temperatures dropped. Snow however brief turned Wigtown bay to a wintery white looking more like Christmas than spring.
Whooper in to roost
Lagoon 1 in the winter sun
a wintery back drop, to the Crook
The Warden, RSPB Crook of Baldoon