White fronted geese

 

Bubwith Ings

A pleasant sunny but cold morning. I had my wellingtons in the house warming, as I intended going to Bank Island, The water level has dropped but I expected some mud. However I left home without my wellingtons, so decided to go to North Duffield Carrs. I walked to the Geoff Smith hide and on my way I could see lots of water and birds on Bubwith Ings. I had a quick look out of the hide window and could only see a few swans in the distance, so returned to my car. I drove over the bridge and parked in the picnic car park on the Bubwith side of the River Derwent.

I then crossed the road and walked along the public footpath which is on the top of the river bank for about 100 yards. I joined another chap who was looking through his telescope, and who informed me that he could see a white fronted goose. There had been twitter reports of three Russian White Fronts in the area, and before long we had managed to locate them all. The markings on one was quite pale and it did not have as much white on its face, which led us to believe that it could have been a juvenile and the other two its parents. Year tick 198.

The geese were too far away for a decent photo and as they were feeding it was not always possible to see their heads. Further away there were about 80 whooper swans, with some mute swans, canada geese, at least 15 male pintails, lots of wigeon. Lapwings were standing on the bits of grass at the edge of the water and I could see redshank, ruff and dunlin.

A male stonechat flew along the fence in front of us. Again too far away to get a good photo.

Just after 1pm the sun went behind the clouds and viewing became difficult, so I left and drove to Bank Island.

As you can see from the photo the cloud cover was blocking out any sun. On the water there were 30+ shelduck, wigeon, canada geese, tufted ducks, mallard and black headed gulls. In the bushes behind me I saw blue tit and a goldcrest. I heard what I thought was gunfire and when I looked towards where the shelducks were, I could see that they had been caught in a net for ringing, which explained the noise. All the other birds flew off so I came home.