Coward of the County - Kenny Rogers

EARLY POST TODAY AS I MUST AWAY - HAVE A 'YOUNG LADY' TO MEET!
THIS POST RELATES TO TUESDAY

The heavy and frequent rain showers continued to roll in, but now from the north west, but the wind did moderate somewhat in speed. Arriving to monitor the Moth Traps, this was the scene at

HARBINS FARMHOUSE

Little doing in Mothsville the highlight being these c3

POPLAR HAWK-MOTHs
along with a

 

FLESH FLY
nasty sounding creature, while on the stable wall these most attractive young

GARDEN SPIDERs
As the weather seemed to be holding it was quickly down to
Longham Lakes where first up, having tired of Mallard the predators
are now turning their attentions to

COOTs EGGs

HOUSE SPARROW
taking advantage of the 'feeding station' while close by

GREAT CRESTED GREBEs

were in full 'display' mode.

Best number this year of
COMMON SWIFT
but I still havn't got the hang of capturing birds on the wing.

Oh, maybe getting a bit better with a bigger and slower target
GREYLAG GEESE
Having mentioned before about approaching the Pumping Station
with a degree of stealth, the camera was brought to bear as the

 COMMON SANDPIPER
 reached the 200 metre mark.

The Geese hadn't even flown out of view by then and being at the furthest point from the entrance, any semblance of 'shelter' was out of the question as the Heavens opened up dropping a fair old bit of rain and hail. Seeking a lee against the Pumping Station wall, at the bottom of a bank, I was only 'soaked to the skin' rather than 'drowned', but ever onward. Reaching the ridge of the bank the

COMMON SANDPIPER
was obviously feeling nervous

but as far as I could tell it hadn't sen me.

Lucky then to get a few shots off before it did and took to the air once more.

The precipitation seemed to have carried a few other things in its wake,

driving this
BLACK-HEADED GULL
onto the pathway and in the far distance a

LITTLE GULL
as well.

 

Showing comparison in size with the good deal larger
Black-headed Gull

the wretched thing couldn't have been any further away from  
terra firma if it wanted to be!

There, or thereabouts, is where it stayed with the photos
being something to be desired,

while taking to the wing occasionally

to feed.
Between here and my next port of call, a few interesting plants
were found including

BROOM

YELLOW (Flag) IRIS

RED CLOVER

and what is thought to be
HOP TREFOIL? (the jury is out on this one).

COWARDS MARSH
is not a place I have visited before, but would have been had I
found the place yesterday

With excellent directions from George Green, via E-mail there was no real reason for not having found my way, but came up against a 5-bar gate blocking the way so gave up the search. Today I was lucky to have bumped into Ian (Grylo) Lewis and his wife Margret who explained where I had gone wrong which was to my advantage!

MARSH COTTAGE

what a lovely spot!
Searching the marsh for the target birds I came across an unexpected

(male) PINTAIL

and very soon after, relocated the 'reported'

BARNACLE GOOSE
(make of that what you will)

before catching less than a fleeting glimpse of a bird with a 'downcurved' bill which disappeared, just as quickly, below the line of the river bank. Shortly afterwards I was joined by 3bfellow birders all of whom I had met before in the field. Giving them an update and trying to get them onto the key species the c2

GLOSSY IBIS

put in another and much more rewarding appearance.
(The 5 images above are all from the archive, as the birds were at
'scoping distance only and not even worth raising the camera).

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