January 1st at Blacktoft

 

Change of plan for today, so in between doing a taxi job for a family member I managed to fit in 3 hours birding at Blacktoft.

I started at Ousefleet where the konic ponies were enjoying their breakfast.

Lots of lapwings on the islands. They kept flying about but I counted about 360 and 15 shelduck.

Reedling hide was home to 150 wigeon, 50 mallard and a few gadwall and teal, while 13 snipe were at the waters edge.

Marsh harriers were active, especially these 2.

I think that the bottom bird is one of last years young and the top bird an adult male, possibly his parent. There was a lot of calling whenever the two birds were close.

A nice steady start to 2024