Valentines day in the Lower Derwent Valley.

 

RSPB York Local Group monthly walk, and today is was in the LDV. 10 am at Bank Island was the plan.

I arrived a good 90 minutes earlier so that I could have a long watch from the viewing platform, plus I wanted to call in at the Natural England office and collect my copy of the 2022 Filey report.

This was my view. Like a lot of places the water levels are very high after the recent rain, and the River Derwent has burst it banks again. RSPB Blacktoft Sands is closed for the next few days because of the flooding caused by recent high tides.

The rest of our group for the day arrived about 10am and by the time we left I had 29 birds on my day list, including grey partridge, my 126 tick for this year. There was lots of activity, with blue and great tits chasing each other about. Goldfinch, greenfinch and song thrush could be heard singing.

The viewing platform at Thorganby was the 2nd stop of the day.

Once again a lot of water, this time you could see that it had spread right across the valley. We were not able to locate a little owl, which can often be seen in the area. A red kite, perched in a distant tree was added to the list.

North Duffield Carrs was stop number 3.

The water was still pouring over the river bank onto the reserve, and only the roof of garganey hide was visible. Ian, a fellow volunteer at Blacktoft was in the hide when we arrived. He very kindly pointed out some of the birds on view, before vacating his seat to allow one of our group to sit down. 4 little grebes were on the water in front of the hide. It was not possible to see the boundaries of what was the scrape as the level of the water was so high. A small flock of dunlin were flying about, no doubt looking for dry land, and just before we left, 2 groups of golden plover flew east.

Stop number 4 was at Bubwith Bridge. Lots of whooper swans, some of whom were calling, no doubt restless and ready to go west on the start of their journey back to Iceland. Sadly the rain started and persisted for the rest of the afternoon. A kestrel hunting for its lunch brought our day list up to 42.

Aughton Church was stop  number 5.

Once again we could see across the valley and no sign of the river bank. A male pochard was diving for food a little way from the churchyard, increasing our day list.

Ellerton was our last stop for the day. The rain had become more persistent which made viewing difficult as bins, scopes and spectacles  became difficult to see through. A wren, 3 mistle thrushes and a group of skylarks helped to bring our day list total to 46 birds.

A pleasant day, despite the rain.