Monday, October 11, 2004

Whooper Swans

I managed to drag myself away from the Langtoft Wryneck (as well as the bosom of my family) for a while yesterday and headed down to Prior's Fen for an hour or so.
There had clearly been a bit of Sky Lark passage and the pits were full of wigeon (still largely in eclipse). The only waders apart from the hundreds of Lapwings and Golden Plovers and few snipe, were 2 Dunlin and 2 Redshank. I was rewarded with a nice male Merlin hunting Linnets and flushed a Jack Snipe (plus 8 Snipe) and watched a nice herd of 13 Whooper Swans, my first of this winter. Boy, were they nervous and soon left the area...

They spot me hundreds of yards away, while they are resting in a ploughed field with some gulls...

Then they take to the air and head half a mile north...

...and just to prove they really are Whoopers, here's a close-up of a couple of the birds.

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