It rained, quite heavily at times, till just before lunch, then the SE wind switched to SW and it remained dry.
Unfortunately, I only had time for a morning walk today and managed a good soaking (Malcolm)
South Shore
Black Redstart - the female type was half way along Ocean Edge foreshore. Fortunately it was still around when Janet checked in the afternoon. These are some of her shots.
Wigeon 250 many taking advantage of the high tide to access gutweed on some of the close in rocks.
Shag 1 probably the adult on the wooden jetty
Rock Pipit 3
The other day I showed how the cormorants disable large Bass they catch by breaking their gill filaments. This both starves them of oxygen and causes severe blood loss. Today's sequence shows that better (fortunately this was beside No.2 outflow, providing shelter from the rain).
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| The Cormorant drags its hooked bill tip through the gills. At this point the Bass is still active and the Cormorant is at risk of being stabbed by the Bass' needle sharp dorsal fin spines. You can see them in this shot |
This clip is less than a minute later and the Cormorant senses no resistance from the Bass. It dives one last time.
I would be interested to know how long a meal this size will sate a Cormorant (Malcolm)
Just I was heading back to my car through the Nature Park, the rain stopped! Two Goldcrest were flitting through the trees. This is a rubbish clip of one of them, but there is precious little else today. It does show how active they are through the trees, it only stopped briefly for a post rain preen. Unfortunately not long enough for me to get it in focus.
Middleton Nature Reserve
Goosander 4 - 1 male. On "no swimming" pond
Just out of the recording area - horse paddock behind Middleton Parish Hall
Glossy Ibis feeding in the field next to the horse paddock. It was by itself this morning, but yesterday it had two feeding companions
Ibis, Shelduck and Redshank
