Perhaps the best part of these shorter days from my perspective is that you don't have to get up at an ungodly hour to appreciate the best of the day. Out the house at first light and had a lovely stroll around Radipole as the rising sun painted the scene the deepest orange. Happened upon the concrete bridge weasel - my third weasel sighting in consecutive days. I can't think that in the past I have seen weasel in three consecutive years - he is by no means an un-obliging weasel!
Huge commotion beneath and down stream of the bridge which transpired to be a shoal of very large and somewhat agitated mullet, and while watching them I witnessed a pike breach in pursuit of its prey - something I have only witnessed once before on Ham Wall, but a first for the home turf.
Thin-lipped grey mullet By Allan Neilson.
I was wondering whether the mullet anxiety was otter related as only yesterday I found some mullet scales, clearly the remnants of an otter binge, but my patience wasn't to be rewarded with a sighting. There was some spraint a little further up the Buddleia Loop which had been deposited in the night so clearly they weren't too far away. The whooper family were still very much in evidence beyond the shelter and more than a dozen bearded tits flitting across the reed heads.
The hide was awash with teal, two sandpipers I couldn't identify at long range in low light, two pairs of stone chat and two kingfisher... and not a primate in sight - what introvert dreams are made of!