I was back at Coucher Hide yesterday, almost a year after I'd last posted some photos from Fen Drayton Lakes. It was almost 'deja vu' of last year - 3 great white egret, over 30 little egret and maybe 10 heron - plus perhaps 50 cormorant, with a beautiful blue sky and light winds. This lake seems to come alive at this time of year, so I guess it coincides with some stage of fish fry because it hasn't been this busy at other times.
What was interesting was the degree of 'coordinated' fishing going on. The cormorants were often fishing in the shallows and the egrets and herons followed, in large numbers, on the bank-side catching the fish that fled their way and not getting too worked up at the other birds alongside them. Even the gulls were in on the act, doing shallow dives with some success. The fish were truly abundant - I watched one heron take 3 fish, all 3-4 inches long within the space of a minute.
A spectacular sight!