Away from Base Camp and getting all twitchy

The Safari had a weekend away with Wifey and t'mutt in the Yorkshire Dales. Snow was forecast and the Yorkshire Dales are renowned for being snowy. And if you're going to get snowed in while on a mini-break is there anywhere better to be staying than a 17th century pub?

Especially one that's esteemed in literary circles and has really good beer.

We were there for some family time but there was the potential for a perhaps a couple of additions to the Challenge tally. 

The hoped for snow never materialised at valley level so our picture postcard village pics weren't going to happen. There was a bit of mist though.

The plan was to have a scrumlicious breakfast then head out for a wander around the nearby Aysgarth Falls. It was here we hoped to see (and phtograph) a Grey Wagtail with a very outside chance of a Green Woodpecker, we've seen one here before feeding on anthills a few years ago. The birds had other ideas; the village was full of House Sparrows, Blackbirds and Collared Doves but the woods along the river were full of nowt!

With plenty of water in the river the falls put on a thunderous show. Walking downstream from the car park there are two sets of falls, first the 'Middle Falls'.

Then a couple of hundred yards further on the 'Lower Falls'

A close up view -

To get to the 'Upper Falls' it's back to the car park and a short walk beyond.

As you can see we've try to go a bit arty - which do you prefer the fast or slow shutter speed?

We just got back to our digs in time before the rain came down heavy. We couldn't see it but it was snowing quite heavily on the fell tops. 

Sat indoors chilling out watching the telly in the vafternoon was when news broke of a pair of Lesser Scaup just two miles from Base Camp - and were were now 60 miles away - how horrendously unfortunate! But would they stick until tomorrow??? We'd be back by mid-afternoon.

In the evening the rain cleared and we managed a short wander round the village - if you can wander 'round' a linear village, down to the village green with it's 17th C Market Cross dated 1674 and 19th C chapel, denoted by the Yew trees at the gate, and tiny schoolhouse next door.

There was a small Starling murmuration of no more than a 100 birds too, possibly going to roost in the dense branches of those Yew trees.
The following morning the mist had cleared on our pre-breakfast dog walk giiving views of the fells and their smattering of snow, not much to write home about really.

The drive back to Base Camp was very picturesque with some sunshine and more snow

Ingleborough hill was looking particularly splendid with mist drooling over the saddle.

Ribblehead viaduct never fails to impress especially under sa bright blue sky - no trains today though.

A lovely weekend away and we even spotted a Brown Hare on the drive home.

Back at Base Camp we saw there had been no further local news of the Lesser Scaup - they'd gone...but to where?

 

In fact they hadn't gone far, they'd pitched up at Leighton Moss but again would they stick until we could get there, fingers, toes, buttocks were all well and truly crossed.

We picked up CR on Friday morning and headed north to meet IH at Lillian's Hide Leighton Moss with the intention of sprinting, aka slightly brisker walk than our normal dawdle, to Lower Hide. The plan paid off.

It only took a matter of seconds to locate the male Lesser Scaup in amongst a small flock of, mainly, Tufted Ducks. #118. Job done - we could go home now but cjose to hang around to see what else was about - it'd be rude not too.

As you can see in the back ground there was a selection of other ducks on the water.

Gadwall and Shoveler with quite a few Teal too, along with some unphotographed Goldeneyes.

Indeed the Teal were very vosl in the brighter minutes some of the males thought about doing some displaying.

Their almost bell like whistles filled the air with sound accompanied by the booming of several Bitterns. All of a sudden there was a commotion and a major panic. A Marsh Harrier that had been quartering the reedbeds in the distance had snuck round and was now attacking a group of Teal, Osprey like, just to our left. One individual was hit but managed to free itself by doing a deep dive then coming up for air and immediatley doing a vertical take off right underneather the harrier but far too quick for it - a lucky escape, and a hungry Marsh Harrier. CR managed to get some shots off but we were content to witness the action through the bins.

With the ensuing panic the ducks moved to another part of the lake so we took our leave of the hide and wandered slowly back to the Feeding Station passing booming Bitterns and shouty Cetti's Warblers on the way - both completely hidden, the Cetti's Warblers in particular taking the Micky out of us by singing just far enough into the cover of the reedbeds to be invisible to us. 

One of the days star attractions was the large number of brilliantly coloured Scarlet Elf Cap fungi brightening up the woodland floor here there and everywhere.

Apparently if you blow on them (you have to get down to their level to do that though) they release their spores in a big cloud. But it's not the motion of the blown air that triggers this reaction it's the slight increase in temperate your breath brings. We surmise that in the shade of the woodland floor any dappled sunlight coming through and lighting them up would be what they were waiting for, not some kahki clad numpty down on all fours huffing and puffing at them...they might be there a while if they were waiting for the latter.

The Feeding Station was quite lively with the usual suspects 

But a strikingly bright male Bullfinch stole the show. We failed miserably at getting an 'in habitat' shot of him so you'll have to put up with these two of him on the top of the feeder pole.

Butties were munched in Lillian's Hide were we soon ticked off the long staying Ring Necked Duck, miles away so no pics today. After being fed and watered we set off for Tim Jackson Hide where a trio of Snipe, the first of the day for us, were pointed out. We're still to find a Jack Snipe here this year and not for wnat of trying.

We took advantage of a rather dapper drake Teal making his way through the vegetation just outside the window.

Would you look at those vermiculations - simply stunning!

A few Lapwings were in display mode too, a great sound as they divied making that unique 'peewit' call, the soundtrack of our youth.

Looking closely at the diving bird you can see its tongue sticking out - we wonder if that's got any bearing on how the distinctive call is made...note to self - try to get better shots of this behaviour.

Splendid looking birds are Lapwings!

A Little Egret was in the pool too. So far we'd seen several Herons and a couple of distant Great White Egrets (as has been usual so far this year) but this was the first Little Egret of the day.

Then another of the half dozen or more Marsh Harriers flew over causing a bit of constenation and giving us our cue to head to the Grisedale Hide (spelled correctly for the first time ever).

Out of the Grisedale Hide windows we quickly found the bonny but dodgy duck known as the Cinnamon Teal x Shoveler hybrid but couldn't get a pic of him and after a couple of minutes he flew and left the pool - so annoying as he is quite sriking. We had to make do with more 'normal' fare.

Again the Marsh Harrier flew over

and then circled again giving us undoubtedly our best ever shot of this species.

That eye has some serious menace!

Once it was gone it was back to photographing the ducks. Unforunately the Pintail wouldn't come any closer so you can't make out his wonderful vermiculations.

You might even think Shovelers don't have vermiculations with their big block of ortange on their flanks, but you'd be wrong. Have a close look at the upper rear of that orange block and you'll se the tell tale dark wigly lines of vermiculations.

It would be very interesting to see what they look like under UV light, a wavelength that birds can see but we can't. Do they dazzle or dapple against the water surface or are they invisble, mysteries, mysteries.

In the left hand corner of the pool there lay a Great White Egret - yes Lay. It was having forty winks chilled out lying down on the dryish mound of cut reeds. It had been like that for many minutes until we ecided we'd get a shot of that unusual behaviourand as soon as we gotr to the window it stood up and had a right old shake. How rude of it. At least it was close unlike all the others we've seen this year.

Atfer a bit of a feather-settling shimmy and a short preen it had a bit of a walk about without doing much in particular.

Before settling down to have an upright snooze.

We let it go about its vertical slumbers to watch a female Marsh Harrier drifting low over the tops of the reeds.

Obviously looking for something tasty. With no luck she rose higher and did a couple more circuits before drifting off out of view.

Although it was only early afternoon IH persuaded us to decamp and move on to another site. We had a brief stop at the Allen Hide on the saltmarshes seeing only a few Shelducks upended in the deeper than usual water. We didn't do to the Eric Morecambe pool but maybe we should have as there were a good number of Avocets there when IH went back later on.

Instead we went to the nearby quarry and quickly relocated the Raven's nest, complete with the top of a Raven's head just visible above the impressive mound of sticks. IH soon had us puffing and panting as we climbed the path that goees around the top of the quarry. There wasn't much to point the camera at, still not many signs of spring up there. We did get a brief glimpse of a Jay, more than we saw last week but still not enough of a sighting to even think about raising the camera...could Jay turn out to be this year's bogey bird for the Challenge?

A good afternoon's mini-hike but not much in the way of distant views due to the hazy cloud. Not been up there for a long while so it made a refreshing change from staring at the vermiculations on a variety of ducks.

Where to next? A southbound safari is coming up soon. Hopefully it'll be full of good stuff for your delectation.

In the meantime let us know who's got all the vermiculations in your outback.