Good afternoon! Apologies for two posts in a day but I am going into a local school to talk about the Big Garden Birdwatch tomorrow morning so I won’t be able to blog then!
I will begin with some pictures from Sunday:
The washland in the morning sunshine with a great white egret just about visible:
A close up view of the aforementioned great white egret:
A female marsh harrier hunting:
Image credits: Matt Walton
...And here are some Big Garden Birdwatch themed images from behind the visitor centre:
A goldfinch:
A chaffinch:
A great tit:
Image credits: Adrian Stilwell
Thank you very much to Matt and Adrian for sharing these great images with us.
We had a great view of a barn owl hunting behind the visitor centre on Sunday afternoon and there were plenty of gulls present on the washland. Pick of the bunch had to be an adult Mediterranean gull. This species is quite scarce here so this was a great record. An adult Caspian gull was also present along with at least 14 yellow legged gulls.
A welcome visitor returned on Monday when a bittern landed at the edge of the visitor centre pond. We haven’t seen one from the visitor centre window for a white so it was great to see once again.
I popped down on Tuesday afternoon and spent a pleasant hour dodging the showers up at the Washland viewpoint. At least two barn owls were hunting and there were two goldeneyes present on the main pool. The gulls were playing hard to get so I only got brief views of two adult Caspian gulls.
There were two great white egrets present in front of the Washland viewpoint yesterday morning and a second winter Caspian gull was present in the same area at lunch time.
I went for a circular walk incorporating New Fen viewpoint this morning and a corn bunting flew south over East Wood. A kingfisher was also hunting in front of the Washland viewpoint which was my first sighting of one this year.
The bittern reappeared at the edge of the visitor centre pond mid-morning and there was a mixed flock of around 200 fieldfares and redwings in Brandon Fen. A merlin was seen from Joist Fen viewpoint and several bearded tits were seen in the same area.
The weather forecast for the next couple of days isn’t looking too bad so why not come and visit? Look out for my next recent sightings blog post on Monday morning. We hope to see you soon!