It'll be all White on the Night

A pleasant walk around the environs of Burton Point produced a good selection of birds including a ringtail Hen Harrier, a jack Merlin and tens of Black-tailed Godwits and Meadow Pipits.

As sod’s law dictates, after theorising about the lack of male raptors on the estuary, the last three Merlin I have seen – including this evening’s bird – have been males, after seeing no more than a handful over the last five years!

The Godwits and the Pipits were taking advantage of the inundation of the marsh by the recent high tides; the stately waders probing busily in the softened and saturated earth, whilst the Pipits foraged along the strandline.

Migrants included two male Wheatears behind the sheep pens, and also notably a White Wagtail feeding with a group of Pipits near the sentry box.

A local Green Woodpecker was also making its presence known with a series of loud yaffles and also giving its voice box a good work out was a Common Buzzard taking advantage of the weak early spring thermals.

Plenty of Wrens singing today too – they have been eerily quiet since the harsh winter, but over the last three or four days I have heard a fair few birds breaking into verse. I always assumed Wrens to be largely resident, but I can only assume that there has been a recent influx of these diminutive passerines from the continent?

Until later.