A lovely warm and calm day along the Mere footpath this morning. Probably spent more time chatting to Jon, Sue and Paul along my walk than I did walking. Lots of stuff to see though so let's crack on shall we -
First field edge was scanned and there was the usual
Greenshank. I also thought there was a Ringed Plover but 2 feathers arranged just so can also look like a Ringed Plover 😂 A
Common Sandpiper flew in as I walked away and disturbed a
Water Rail from the reeds.
Into second field and a walk along the water side was very pleasant with the occasional
Little Gull feeding over the water. A couple of
Great Crested Grebe and 3
Little Grebe were just off shore.
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| Great Crested Grebes |
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| Little Grebe |
Jon was on good form this morning and we exchanged pleasantries. He was good enough to let me see the
Garganey through his scope, it has been been for over 2 weeks now (the Garganey, not his scope, although I'm surprised it hasn't taken root yet 😀.
Into third field/Snipe Grounds and up in the far corner of the stubble field was a small herd of
Pink-footed Goose. I counted 26 at the time but later revised that figure to 30.
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| 30 Pink-footed Goose |
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The eagle-eyed may spot an object in the left foreground that I only noticed when I was reviewing my pics this afternoon. There are always birds flying through the camera field of view when taking photos and you learn to ignore them unless they are obviously something different. A crop of this object doesn't really help id:
At first I thought it looked like a bat sp. but what would a bat be doing flying in broad daylight? Buzzard was suggested so does this comparison help?
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| Buzzard and un-id object for comparison |
I'm not sure. Looking at the original it seems a bit small for Buzzard when you look at the geese behind it. Any suggestions gratefully received.
In Snipe Grounds I saw a
fox and expected it to run off as they usually do when people approach. This one didn't and was obviously hunting something in the long grass as it was twitching its ears and concentrating. It eventually pounced and was eating a small mammal when I saw its head again. I then saw why it probably hadn't run off because it had a very nasty wound on its back end that was visible from both left and right side views. Maybe the wound had become infected as it didn't look good at all.
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| Injured fox not looking well |
I walked on with the fox still in the same place and hoped it would be OK, as it was obviously feeding alright. (A freind of mine later arranged for the RSPCA to put out a cage trap to try and catch the animal in the hope that it can be helped).
The next field also gave me great views of a mammal, this time a
Roe Deer.
As I was photographing the deer a
Wren flew into the flowers in front of me:
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| Wren - common but beautiful |
I walked back the way I'd come and intended to go on to KP then to the sea front. As I got into first field I saw a
Sparrowhawk fly across in front of me and over the Mere towards Swan Island. It was too quick for me to get a photo of course.
However, it was useful in that it put up the birds around it and I spotted 2
Dunlin as they flew off.
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| Dunlin flushed by a Sprawk |
Down at the water's edge a
Snipe disappeared into the undergrowth rather than flushing?! Maybe it just hadn't heard or seen me as I was still a fair way off as I scanned the edge with my bins.
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