A MAN FROM THE NORTH AND ROSEMARY'S DUCKS

Earlier in the week I had the pleasure of meeting up with a fellow blogger.  

Adrian  the self styled old age traveller of Adrian's Images fame, he who keeps us entertained with his dry and witty musings as he wends his way around the country in his camper van accompanied by his faithful sidekicks  Alf and Molly, had come to visit  'our patch' for a couple of days.  

I'm not going to bore you with the details of what we did or where we went, Adrian tells it much better than I ever could in his blog.

 
The first day was spent walking around Keith's local lake, Caldecote.  And later a photo session with some ornamental ducks on the pond  at Adrian's camp site. The evening before Adrian had chatted up and worked his charm on Rosemary the proprietor'ess of the campsite who came and unlocked the gate to the pond and allowed us to go in and take photographs at our leisure . (there was a high electric fence and cage around the pond to keep out the local foxes and other unwelcome visitors!)


Rosemary's Ducks

                       
                        Bahama Pintail                                 Silver Bahama Pintail

                         Marbled Teal                                              Ferruginous Duck

                                Chiloe Wigeon                                Cinnamon Teal

                                           Mr and Mrs Carolina Wood Duck

Day two involved an early start and a visit to Summer Leys reserve in Northamptonshire. Unfortunately the wildfowl on the water were mobile and distant after being disturbed be a group of people using boats to undertake some sort of survey work. 

A distant Shelduck adds some colour to the grey water.

One highlight of the day was seeing a beautiful pair of Bullfinches as they visited the feeding station and also a paddling cock Pheasant. 

He looked none too happy getting his feet wet!

A female Reed Bunting bracing herself against the wind!

And further on a group of Goldfinch shining in the sunlight as they busily fed on some Teasel  heads.

 

And to round the day off Adrian treated Keith and myself to a meal in the local pub.

Thanks Adrian, it was a pleasure to meet and walk with you,  I hope you enjoyed your all too brief visit to our local patch. Perhaps next time you'll be able to stay a bit longer and we can show you more of our local sites, and maybe with some sunshine thrown in for good measure!

Location - Location - Location

I'm back!!...well I've never been away really. I've just not posted for a while due to various reasons, lack of time, lack of inspiration or, more to the point, I guess it's just been down to shear laziness on my part!!  Although you'll be pleased to know that I haven't forgotten you all and I've been keeping up to date with reading all of your blogs. (sorry for the lack of comments!!).

                                                   ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 This is the first in a series of three posts (not many words of wisdom just a selection of images that I hope you will enjoy) each one dedicated to a different location that I've had the pleasure of visiting since the beginning of the month.

The first day of February dawned cold and frosty and at around 5.30 am I arrived at Keith's house on the start of our 200+ mile round trip to the RSPB's reserve at Titchwell Marsh in Norfolk. We arrived just after 8am, after experiencing a beautiful red sunrise during the journey, to a cold sunny blue sky morning. It looked like being a good day weather wise, little did we know that out on the reserve a strong bitterly (and I mean BITTERLY !!) cold Easterly wind was blowing directly from Siberia!! 

After a cup of coffee and some sandwiches (thanks Keith) in the car park and a photo session with the numerous Robins that soon appeared to greet us, they're well fed I think and hence quite confiding, we set of on our walk around the reserve.

 

Around by the back of the back of the visitor centre Keith soon spied a group of Redpoll feeding high up in some Alder trees and it was not long before he had spotted that they were not only  Lesser Redpolls but also Common, or Mealy, Redpolls, and then he exclaims "there!, look!, that one's much lighter than the others, I reckon that's an Arctic Redpoll" And sure enough once the visitor centre was open it was confirmed by the staff and the sightings book that it was indeed a Coues's Arctic Redpoll! So it looked like we were off to good start, and within minutes of leaving the car!

Common Redpoll (I think!)

 

As soon as we left the cover of the trees we felt the full force of the cold wind which made it very difficult to hold our bino's and cameras steady and as most birds were at a distance picture taking opportunities were mostly curtailed to 'fly byes'.

Brent Geese

Greylag Geese

Pintail (male)

Shelduck (male)

Black - Tailed Godwit

Grey Plover

 

We had pre booked a guided walk (highly recommended, and free to RSPB members) for 12.30pm so, after more coffee and sandwiches, we met up with our guide, David Pelling, for a very enjoyable and informative  tour were he explained all about the history and objectives of the reserve as well as pointing out some of the birds that we had missed previously!

 

So, after around 8 hours of excellent birding (apart from the wind, that is!) and a count of 63 different species of bird it was time to set off on the two and a half hour journey for home.

Time for Home

 

A short video  mainly of the wind!!!