Wednesday 1 December 2010

An ebbing tide

The Safari noticed that the Peregrine was roosting in the usual place last night for the first time in a while...could have been ‘round the back’ though given the recent wind directions. Still there before dawn this morning. We had no more Fox encounters. A couple of kids were playing on the field when we arrived for our evening game of footy, (the Peregrine wasn’t seen at this time so must have arrived sometime during the night) later on there was still no sign of our furry friend but we left him a few dog biscuits and some unsmoked bacon, all of which had disappeared on our pre-dawn walk. The bread and chips someone else had left were uneaten being frozen solid to the rock. Wonder what he’ll get for his tea tonight? Supposed to be -8°C tomorrow night – very cold for our wildlife to endure, although another weather website suggests it might only go down to -1°C – they both can’t be right! We’ll let you know which of them the winner in the accuracy stakes was.
Out on Patch 2 we didn’t have any slippery trouble reaching the wall, yesterday’s ‘warm’, hahaha, sunshine and stiff breeze had got rid of most of the ice. The tide was dropping just enough to start leaving a bit of beach. The first birds on to it were a couple of Redshanks and three Common Gulls.
Out at sea it was hardly lively but there was stuff about. A couple of small flocks of Common Scoters were found and a few were flying about. A ‘flock’ of three Great Crested Grebes flew south towards the mouth of the estuary while three single Red Throated Divers were seen at various bearings and distances.
Five Shelducks passing our vantage point travelling north were nice to see. Other than that little lot there wasn’t a lot else although on the rapidly growing beach gull numbers quickly built up. A cursory scan through the nearer ones revealed nothing of any particular note.
No lunchtime safari today...busy, busy, busy!!!
Where to next? More of the same until the weekend looks to be par for the course.
In the meantime let us know what’s been passing the vantage point in your outback.

1 comment:

Neil Spiers said...

Back to River Ribble for me, snow snow snow and more snow was had in Preston. Solitary Redshank got startled by myself oooops!!, Grey Heron and Little Grebe was the only one species I'd not seen on the River before but nice to see. Headed back to the car RIGHT QUICK as was freezing!!!

Neil