Donna Nooked

Cute, huh?
Donna Nook of course, we had a trip out there with our fellow RSPB crew at Carsington. Amazing place, the numbers say it all; 842 seal pups, 955 cows and 344 bulls. All sorts of stories going on with them, to left and right there were new borns, suckling mums, mums ready to give birth, beachmaster brutes fighting for mating patches, and abandoned pups not yet driven to the sea by their hunger. Real wildlife spectacle this one. Zillions of people around too, which makes sense because these few weekends are the best for visiting the colony and it really has to be the weekend because access to the beach is closed for the RAF flyboys to do their bombing practice across the mudflats. These mega visitor numbers make for an odd carnival feel to the whole thing, burger vans and portaloos aren't found at many nature spectacles, so all it's a world of difference from the cold solitudinous suffering that makes for most birding trips at this time of year. Shan't complain about that. The long walk from the dunes to the shore with the low tide does ask a little bit of work from you, which is an effort altogether worth making because there's action far out there, lots of fighting and mating in shallows you miss if you're afraid to get your boots a bit muddy (well... a lot muddy!).

Bird-wise there was always a distant passage of waders, dozens of Curlew, Redshank, Knot, and Brent Geese are always good to see, Great Black-backed Gulls presumably patrolling for afterbirth were nice too. Singles of Turnstone and Sanderling fought the winds down on the shoreline. Bird of the day was a single male Snow Bunting (#226) that overflew during the long trudge across the mudflats. The highly distinct black and white of the wings making for a very welcome, very easy to ID passerine fly over, and for me, a lifer!

After the many dramas of the Grey Seals we took to Rimac for a brief afternoon visit. The potential for Hen Harrier, Short-eared Owls and other top class birds is clear, the best we could muster was a noisy cloud of Twite, a faraway Little Egret, a Sparrowhawk, and Stonechat. A quiet visit then but the saltmarsh not without scenic beauty, well in the right light anyway.

Lots of pictures taken by girlfriend and me, and I've struggled to edit them down to just a few, so here's lots of thumbnails (click to enlarge):

Hello!

Plus bonus videos taken by the girlfriend:
The Seal Scene
Fresh Born Pup

Norfolk Trip Part Four: Cley Marshes

Onto the Sunday, we were staying in a holiday flat just west of Sheringham, less than ten miles away from NWT Cley Marshes, so it was there I was dropped off while my SO went shopping.
The reserve has a futuristic looking new visitor centre, so futuristic in fact that it isn't yet open. Same goes for some of the paths and one of the hides, something I wish the chap taking my entrance fee had told me. It really is pretty dismaying to trudge half a mile or more along a shingle bank to find a hide marked on the map is only half constructed and well cordoned off.
Otherwise it was a pretty good day.

Again the Avocet, Oystercatcher, Black-tailed Godwit, Redshank, Ruff, Curlew, Lapwing and Golden Plover, were around. In the lagoon to the east of the reserve were a few Dunlin and Ringed Plover.With the Greylag were three Pink-feet feeding in the grass beside one of the lagoons, and late on a flock of 23 flew over. Funny I swear I could remember reading they'd all left for the north well over two months ago.

Feather duster-bottomed Dabchicks were plentiful in the ditch beside the road.

Half way around I reached the shingle sea wall and over it spread a wide sandy beach popular with tourists. I decided to sit, eat my lunch and watch the sea for a while, only saw the ordinary gulls though.

From one hide in particular, the one apart from the three that sit side-by-side, I got wonderfully close views of Redshank...

...and Avocet.


In the sky all day sailed the Marsh Harriers, two females and a male it seemed, which is about the average bigamous ratio for these raptors.

If my visit was anything to go by Cley Marshes was very good, if not quite up the high standards of Snettisham and Titchwell, just on the basis of the bird-life around. Maybe when that visitor centre opens it'll nudge itself up a few more points.

ETA: Forgot to mention the Cetti's Warbler, I was told they were around but found nothing of them until very late in the day when I heard one calling. As is commonly the way with Cetti's, heard and not seen.