Pages

Tuesday 21 February 2012

Singing Skylarks

A quick trip around the local patch this morning, first a look at the old fort at Shoreham and then a stroll along the harbour arm in search of exotic gulls. The reality was that there were very few gulls to be seen at all. At the end of the arm 5 Razorbills were constantly diving but there was precious little else to be seen. On the return to the car I found 5 Purple Sandpipers on the wooden piles out in the harbour entrance. A further scan of the rooftops of the warehouses in the port revealed only the commoner species of gull so it was off to Widewater for a quick check.  Very quiet here too, though a very fine Pintail drake was a welcome sight.


Purple Sandpipers
 So home via the gull roost at Ferring, and you guessed it - very quiet - though there were both Black-headed Gulls and Common Gulls showing the early signs of their plumage change.


Black-headed Gull

Black-headed Gull

Common Gull
Having arrived home for an early lunch and with the sun still shining it was off to The Burgh. As soon as I parked at the triangle the Rough-legged Buzzard showed along with about 8 Common Buzzards and 4 Red Kites. There were plenty of small birds about but it was the Skylarks that were stealing the show, lots of them singing their heads off. A very cool westerly breeze sprang up and everything went rather quiet. Just the odd raptor flying at distance. Oddly enough there was plenty of ploughing being done and the air was filled with Gulls!

Skylark

Skylark

No comments:

Post a Comment