Friday 11th. May 2012

With a dry day , albeit windy , I made an early start and started the track at Elmley just after 0800 this morning . At times the wind was almost gale force , especially from the car park down to the hides , and the early clear blue skies soon clouded over with just occasional sun showing through . But , it was good to be out , and this post will be photos and captions ;

The first part of the track seemed to be covered with Skylarks , intent on playing 'Chicken' .

One of the hoped for species , Yellow Wagtail , was just off the track to the right .

With water in all the ditches and most scrapes , plenty of Redshank around .

On an area of turned ground , these Oystercatchers were getting to know each other .

A  lone Avocet was all that was on the large scrape on the left before the car park .

Several Swallows around the car park , and both mens and ladies toilets are 'occupied' , that is of course by the Swallows . I wonder if any of them were the youngsters that I photographed last year ?
A female Wheatear , the only one I saw on the site , flew off the tall mound at the start of the walk to the hides .

A male Meadow Pipit was singing from a small Hawthorn further down on the left .

Beyond the sea wall , Great Black-backed Gulls hung on the strong wind . A pair of Little Egrets flew off as I approached , and disappeared further along a ditch . I went straight to South Fleet Hide , where I found two birders already scanning the scrapes . Just two Mute Swans in front of the hide .

Lots of Avocets , including some with young  , this parent had four . Then one of the birders said 'got one' , followed his directions and after a while got a glimpse of a Black-winged Stilt , one of two there at present . They were a long way off and when they got disturbed , flew even further away from the hide . We managed to keep track of them as they worked their way around the back of the scrape , at one point flying for some seconds . Whilst they did , we all tried to get shots , and this was

the 'least bad' of the bunch , but the black wings and trailing legs can just be made out . After over an hour of watching , they landed in front of Wellmarsh Hide , so we all packed our gear and hot footed it over there , only to find from a birder who was in the hide when they landed , that they took off almost immediately and he lost sight of them . A further search proved fruitless , but at least we had seen them . I left the other two and started back to the car park , along the way finding ,

Sedge Warbler ,

Reed Warbler ,

and Reed Bunting , all singing , along the way .

Near the feeders , just short of the car park , I found this male White Wagtail . I also had distant views of Marsh Harrier and two views of Hobby .

Heading back down the track to the road , several male Lapwings ' showing off ' .

A movement in the grass turned out to be this Lapwing chick , looking like it had only just hatched , and found another two in the same area . The only adult was some distance away . Another three Yellow Wagtails were also found along the track .

Every ditch and water filled scrape held noisy Marsh Frogs , this male calling for a mate .

These two had already got it together . Quite a size difference .
As usual , from Elmley I headed for the Raptor Viewpoint at Capel Fleet . Things were quiet , just seeing three Marsh Harriers at distance and the usual pair of Kestrel along the wires .

Leaving the Viewpoint , this female Wheatear hopped up on a fencepost as I approached .

On the bend at Capel Fleet , this male looked very tired resting his legs .

This Red-legged Partridge unusually posed for this shot , normally they run off .

Near the top of the hill , I pulled over to let another vehicle pass , looked into the field and saw this Brown Hare .

Looking further into the field , I found a second Hare , shacked up with a Red-legged Partridge ?
Time I was going home .