This Safari was out half an hour earlier than normal...dang dawg! But it did give us the opportunity of seeing the female Peregrine bringing in what appeared to a rather large prey item to the tower. Once there we could hear a lot of commotion going on. There was one already up there which could well have been a juvenile although we didn’t see any feeding going on just a lorra, lorra noise from them.
Talking of noise the local Wrens were loud last night. Never heard anything like it from them before – kept us awake! They seem to have had a good season so far this year; hopefully the national CES (Constant Effort (Ringing = Banding) Scheme) data will confirm that. And again talking of noise, or more accurately lack of it, we totally forgot to mention the two Mute Swans that swam serenely past us on the sea at Patch 2 yesterday (P2 #65 - inching into a decent lead over P1).
Today’s Patch 2 safari gave us only two Grey Seals, one quite close the other way, way out in the distance, fortunately viewing conditions were good.
As we scanned four Sandwich Terns passed through our field of view going north and a flock of eight Shelducks went south. A few hundred yards away from where he was yesterday and the day before was the male Common Scoter, never known such laid back bird – seems to move even less than Lonesome George our ‘local’ Golden Eagle which has been known to be more motionless than a cardboard cut-out! Must go and pay him a visit soon, not been up there for yonks.
The tide was well down and there looked to be a lot of Oystercatchers so we set about counting them expecting to get well into triple figures but only 66 was our final tally.
Our lunchtime safari was much reduced due to torrential drizzle, or heavy light rain whichever you prefer. However, the few scans we had gave us nothing at all over a very flat sea despite the excellent visibility, or at least it was excellent in so far as we could see.
The Safari has received some pics from our Extreme Photographer who was on his own safari a few days ago. He’d been lucky enough to come across a couple of Slow Worms (a species of legless lizard for non-UK readers). Unfortunately they had been basking on a track in the late afternoon sun when a contractor’s vehicle came by and squished them. Sadly both succumbed to their injuries – what a waste...still it confirms that good sized specimens are still present at a site they were known to be at in the early 80s...we can feel further investigations coming on!
Talking of noise the local Wrens were loud last night. Never heard anything like it from them before – kept us awake! They seem to have had a good season so far this year; hopefully the national CES (Constant Effort (Ringing = Banding) Scheme) data will confirm that. And again talking of noise, or more accurately lack of it, we totally forgot to mention the two Mute Swans that swam serenely past us on the sea at Patch 2 yesterday (P2 #65 - inching into a decent lead over P1).
Today’s Patch 2 safari gave us only two Grey Seals, one quite close the other way, way out in the distance, fortunately viewing conditions were good.
As we scanned four Sandwich Terns passed through our field of view going north and a flock of eight Shelducks went south. A few hundred yards away from where he was yesterday and the day before was the male Common Scoter, never known such laid back bird – seems to move even less than Lonesome George our ‘local’ Golden Eagle which has been known to be more motionless than a cardboard cut-out! Must go and pay him a visit soon, not been up there for yonks.
The tide was well down and there looked to be a lot of Oystercatchers so we set about counting them expecting to get well into triple figures but only 66 was our final tally.
Our lunchtime safari was much reduced due to torrential drizzle, or heavy light rain whichever you prefer. However, the few scans we had gave us nothing at all over a very flat sea despite the excellent visibility, or at least it was excellent in so far as we could see.
The Safari has received some pics from our Extreme Photographer who was on his own safari a few days ago. He’d been lucky enough to come across a couple of Slow Worms (a species of legless lizard for non-UK readers). Unfortunately they had been basking on a track in the late afternoon sun when a contractor’s vehicle came by and squished them. Sadly both succumbed to their injuries – what a waste...still it confirms that good sized specimens are still present at a site they were known to be at in the early 80s...we can feel further investigations coming on!
Where to next? The weekend beckon... we could end up anywhere in Safari-land.In the meantime let us know what needs to stay off the tracks in your outback.
1 comment:
Poor old Slow worms :-( Have a good Weekend Dave!
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