Returning Waders

This morning  I started and finished at Restharrow because my camera has finally given up the ghost.  It wasn’t the locking into manual focus that ended up being the problem but the mirror jammed in the up position. Anyway I wanted to get it sent off so I restricted myself to Restharrow and a coffee at the Obs.

At Restharrow there were 2 little ringed plovers plus a common sand though Martyn had had 2 wood sands, greenshank and green sand earlier....and I mean earlier. The oyster catcher chicks are still around and the 2 lapwing chicks are still hanging in there. Today they were on the bank in front of the hide having been pushed off the islands by the cows.

I did take some pictures using my old camera – the Sony A200 – this is very much an entry level camera but it quite good considering it's cost.

Little Ringed Plover

Lapwing chick

Also on the scrape were 2 yellow wagtails (1 adult and 1 juv) and 2 pied wags (juvs).

This afternoon, after posting the camera,  I went down to Backsand so as to be there for the high tide.  In the dyke outside the scrape there were 3 little egrets and on the scrape itself there were eventually 6 green sandpipers, 1 common sandpiper (that disappeared immediately), 4 greenshank and 2 avocet.

Avocet

The islands are now beginning to show but the sandpipers stuck resolutely to the shallow water. One of the greenshanks however did come over to the hide and I managed some reasonable shots.

Greenshank

The greensands did cause me some concerns as to whether I was missing something because  – the one of the left having quite diffuse breast  markings. Physically and behaviour wise it was just like the others. If I’ve got it wrong I sure one of you will say.

Green Sandpipers

Other than that it was only the normal linnets, skylarks, warblers and buntings though on the way back a sparrow hawk attacked a flock of ~ 400 starlings and despite 4 or 5 attempts failed to make a kill – it was very dramatic though.