Local Jaunt

Wednesday May 20

After Pam's Covid and RSV jabs, plus a little recovery time, we drove to Hickling NWT Reserve. New from our last visit were eight small Polish Konig horses, a semi-wild breed used by the NWT to keep grassland grazed on their reserves. Mouse dun with dark manes and tails, I find them very attractive.They are especially useful as they do not get foot rot in marshy conditions.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There is limited viewing from the drive down to Whiteslea Lodge, but there are a couple of places from which one can scan the marshes beyond Brendan's Pool. Two amalgamated families of well grown Greylag hid away from my camera, a Blackcap serenaded from the woods and I caught a glimpse of a Hobby before it disappeared behind trees. Swallows and a few Swifts sped through the skies, a Marsh Harrier lazed its way east and a distant Chiffchaff had us searching. Easy to hear, difficult to see. 

Using one of the new gravelled side paths to the top of the bank, scanning eventually produced two Hobby for my year list. Parked in the designated area at the end of the track, a Willow Warbler sang incessantly from nearby. We ate our lunch here, interrupted by a tanker driver who, very pleasantly, asked us to move so that he could turn around. We watched him fill the Lodge's oil tank and then skilfully turn and drive off. From a different parking place than usual, good job too, we actually saw some birds. We'd heard a distant Cuckoo, one then flew across in front of us, our first sighting. In the next half an hour, we were surrounded by song. The non stop Willow Warbler, Chiffchaff, Reed Warbler, shouting Cetti's, Wren, Chaffinch and Sedge Warbler. Merlin heard a Tree Sparrow. We didn't.

After an icecream at the Centre, we drove to Stubb MIll. Two more Hobby greeted us, but little else apart from a Whitethroat.  A very pleasant interlude.