Thursday 25 July 2013

Scrape Updates 24th July

With the heat and wind of recent weeks the levels in the scrapes are dropping.
At Restharrow the levels are now quite low but that's not the problem, the problem is the vegetation. All the islands are heavily overgrown with little mud on show. Sedge has also been growing strongly in front of the hide so although some waders have been seen ( little stint, wood sand, green sand have all been seen in the last few days - though not by me) they can only be seen either through the vegetation or on the distant islands.
I understand some grass and sedge cutting is planned for this afternoon/evening so hopefully things will improve. I don't know how extensive the cutting will be though because a little grebe can still be seen sitting on a nest to the right of the hide
.
At Backsand water levels are dropping but still has an inch or so before the islands break the surface - yesterday whilst there I could see a black headed gull standing in the water and the water was only half way up it's tarsus. The sedge/reeds there will need topping soon otherwise the view from the hides will be restricted. I've cleared in front of the "photographic hide" but to do the other two by hand is too much.
Yesterday I was there for the high tide roost. When I arrived there was 1 common and 2 green sandpipers present plus sigles of green and redshank.. About 2 hrs before the high tide the birds started arriving and eventually there were 18 greenshank and 25 redshank present. No sandpipers came in on the tide.
I took a few shots but everything was distant.
Green sandpiper

Shanks

Shanks

Shanks at roost between the two islands

Take off


No comments:

Post a Comment