"Hither and Thither"

 

No prizes for identifying where I was on Wednesday the 7th.

Barbara and I went to Flamborough for a few hours sea watching. Sadly no skuas or shearwaters, but good sightings of kittiwakes, gannets, fulmar, scoter and shelduck. Lots of seals.

There were probably several hundred on the exposed rocks.

Thornwick Pools was our next stop.

Not a lot of water or birds, so we called in at Bempton to have a drink and use the facilities.

Lots of gannets and gulls but no auks.

So we came home the long way via Sutton Bank,but no sign of turtle doves.

This was the view from Marshland Hide on Sunday the 11th, when I was on duty.

A few lapwing, 2 green sandpipers

but no ducks!  Then when I looked to my left I saw the reason why,

then they saw me

and off they ran.

It was a hot day with lots of what I call thunderbugs about, the little black ones that appear about harvest time.

Dragonflies were also about

Young birds like reed warbler and sedge warbler.

The water level on Reedling lagoon has been lowered and waders were happily feeding. 2 greenshanks however would chase each other away. This one was on Singleton.

When reception closed at 5pm, Catherine and I went down to singleton, where we spent some time counting snipe then egrets

There were 22 of them, some youngsters.

RSPB York Group visit to Blacktoft on Wednesday and I hope to join them.