As mentioned above,i parked today at Goxhill Haven and began today's visit by scanning the Humber,watching a good passage of Gulls moving west up the estuary straight from the off.The majority were Common Gulls with smaller numbers of Black-heads and some cracking views were had as the light improved.Also moving west were 46 Curlew and on the Humber mud at the Haven,65 redshank fed.
I then headed off,already getting peed off with the wind,it was already pretty blustery to be fair.
From East Marsh Road,i could see the 2 adult male Marsh Harrier from my last visit and a 2nd calendar year female over Dawson City and further on a decent sized flock of 1200 Pinks were grazing on one of their favourite pastures.
As i turned the corner to walk along Chapel Field Road,a lovely adult Common Buzzard gave superb scope views as it perched on one of the old buildings from when this area was an operational airbase in the second world war.
As i passed Chapel Field Farm to the sounds of Hawaiian Geese and Black Swans i finally reached East Halton Beck and enjoyed some shelter walking along the banks.This area always looks like it has some great potential,but i had to make do with another Common Buzz and a Little Egret.
The only notable sighting as i walked along Skitter Road and past Grange Farm were a flock of 42 Fieldfare feeding in an adjacent field,before promptly buggering off.
I reached Winter's and decided to pay the Red-crested Pochard a visit,sure enough he was on his favoured pit,but did go for a little fly around.This is his 4th week in residence and today his orange crown positively glowed in the bright sunshine,what a handsome boy!.
Also present here were 141 Greylag,17 Tufties,6 Little Grebe,3 Cormorant,11 Coot and 40 Curlew.
By now the wind had increased in strength and i battled my way along the sea wall towards the Skitter and as i neared the Skitter itself,a pale Pipit flew past me and landed on the shoreline,a cracking Water Pipit.It was definitely sods law as it was too windy to obtain any video,so i had to make do with scope views,before it did a bunk back onto the mitigation site from where it had come.
Also on the mitigation site,were 37 Curlew,55 Teal and the 2nd calendar year female Marsh Harrier from Dawson earlier in the morning.
A scan of the Humber mud as the tide was dropping off,saw a single Sanderling being seen,but it wasn't there for long before it disappeared,prolonged views of birds was just not happening today and it had a lot to do with the weather,but at least it was new for the year.
I didn't even bother walking around the pools,as i was just about pi**ed off with this wind by now.
The final goodie,or i should re-phrase that,year tick,was a single female Bearded Tit watched battling along the floodbank infront of Dawson into the small reedbed i saw a pair in just before Christmas.They have probably been in there all the time,i just hadn't heard any calls when passing by.
So today was really hard work in the wind,but at least it wasn't peeing down and the Beardie brought my species tally up to 100 species for the year,a really good effort considering the time of year,onwards and upwards to beating last years score.
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| East Halton Beck. |
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| Winter's Pond. |
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| It Was Really Great To Hear The First Skylarks Singing Today. |
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| Drake Red-crested Pochard,Winter's Pond. |
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| Male Marsh Harrier,Goxhill Marsh. |
The
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