A plunging of gannets

Google reliably (!) informs me that one of the collective nouns for gannets is a 'plunging' of gannets. They certainly do plunge, swooping down at around 60 mph from a great height into the sea to catch fish. Interestingly though, these huge birds, whose wingspan is around 2 metres, also have the capacity to hover and twist acrobatically. It's a necessary skill when searching the crowded ledges for enough space to plant their feet, though when they actually plop down to earth, they do lack a certain grace!

There is a pungent aroma from the nest sites. So many birds produce a lot of guano, and the smell is rather unpleasantly like ammonia.

The gannet below had a beakful of grass, intending either to use it on its nest or perhaps to offer as a gift to its mate.

A young gannet glides around on the sea breeze, below. The young start off with black plumage and then gradually lose the black until only the wing tips are dark. They take about 5 years to reach maturity.

This one is putting the brakes on to land...

RSPB Bempton

One of my objectives in making a trip to the East Coast was to meet up with friends from the camera club for an outing to the RSPB reserve at Bempton Cliffs. In this spectacular setting, around half a million seabirds gather in the summer, to nest and raise chicks on the chalk cliffs overlooking the North Sea. It really is an amazing spectacle, with gannets, guillemots, razorbills, kittiwakes and herring gulls jostling for position. If you're lucky you might see puffins too. The puffin population at Bempton appears reasonably stable though elsewhere their numbers have dropped considerably in recent years.

It's incredible how the birds are able to perch and nest on the narrowest of ledges.

Gannets are much bigger than the other sea birds. To the left (below), with black heads, are a couple of guillemots. The grey and white gulls are the pretty kittiwakes. 

The razorbill (below) can be distinguished from the guillemot by its thick, blunt beak and white stripe. 

The view north is of Filey Bay with Filey in the distance.

Oddball

I was thinking of titling this post 'Here be dragons' since I thought the machinery pictured looked rather like a friendly dragon's head! It is in fact a huge piece of machinery called a Bucyrus Erie BE 1150 Walking Dragline Excavator, known as 'Oddball' for short. It is a relic of the opencast coal mining that created the site that is now St Aidan's country park. It has been preserved thanks to the work of enthusiasts who raised money from a number of sources. It stands as a memorial to the 'sunshine miners' who worked the site to produce coal, alongside those (like my grandfather and great-grandfather) who worked the deep pits.  More about it HERE if you're interested.

Bearding the tit in his den

When I first arrived at St Aidan's RSPB reserve, I was intrigued to see a group of birders with binoculars and massive camera lenses, all peering into the scrubby fringe of the pool nearest to the small visitor centre. Of course, I wandered over to see what was going on...

As soon as I got there, I saw a little brown and grey bird hopping around, disappearing into the vegetation and then popping out again somewhere else:

It proved, oddly enough, to be a bearded tit. I've never seen one before and they are usually secretive little birds, living deep in the reedbeds and usually spotted flying over, making a kind of pinging call, or sometimes clinging to a reed. This one was behaving more like a sparrow, hopping around and quite unfazed by the crowd of eager photographers tracking it up and down the shoreline.

My lens is nowhere near long enough for bird photography, so it wasn't easy to get a shot and I didn't want to get in the way of the 'pros'. I set my camera to what I thought might work ( ! - not an expert at this type of photo) and fired off a few shots when the bird revealed itself for a few seconds. These photos are heavily cropped, so the quality is poor but I was still very pleased to see this little charmer. 

Apart from that exciting 'spot' I didn't see anything else unusual, though I heard a bittern booming. There are supposed to be black-necked grebes on the reserve but I couldn't see them in the areas I explored. The birds I saw were all the common ones: mute swans, mallard, moorhens and coots, teal, great crested grebes, cormorant, reed bunting, magpie, great and blue tits, black-headed gulls, terns, tufted ducks and the pretty gadwall (below).

St Aidan's RSPB reserve

I discovered that there is a fairly new RSPB reserve, St Aidan's, just to the south-east of Leeds so, one recent, bright day, I went there to explore. It was formerly an open-cast coal mine but in 1988 a breach to the bank of the adjacent River Aire caused catastrophic flooding, resulting in the formation of a large lake. Mining operations were completed and eventually the whole site was converted into a wetland, and transferred into the ownership of Leeds City Council. It is now a 990 acre country park and since 2017 has been leased to and managed by the RSPB (Royal Society for the Protection of Birds).

The habitat includes reedbed, wetland, meadows and woodland and there are miles of paths and bridleways criss-crossing the site. I was there for almost four hours and only saw a fraction of it. It was a lovely, warm, spring-like day and right in the middle of the schools' half-term so there were quite a lot of visitors. People chatting, with children and dogs running about meant there were few birds brave enough to be seen clearly. You need to be up and about early to make the most of the birding opportunities, I think. It was, nevertheless, a most pleasant place to explore.

Artistic licence

It has continued wet and cold here, apart from the odd day when there have been a few tantalising hints of warmer sunshine, so I still haven't been inclined to get out much to take photos. (Where is Spring?) I have, however, spent some time processing images and attempting a few artistic effects. It's fun and very absorbing. This is another picture of reedbeds, taken at the Leighton Moss RSPB reserve, where I visited in late March. Don't ask me what I did to it! I just kept on trying different things... but ended up quite happy with this result.

Ducks

A selection of ducks that came near enough to the hides for me to photograph:

At Leighton Moss there is large population of teal. They are small dabbling ducks; the males have very attractive plumage and the females are rather less showy, mottled brown. Some breed here but many are winter visitors from the Baltic and Siberia.

For many years I overlooked and could never identify the duck below: a (male) gadwall. I've got better at spotting them lately. They are not especially common, only about 1200 summer breeding pairs in the UK, though more overwinter here. From a distance they just look grey but seen close up they are actually rather pretty, with nice faces and subtly patterned plumage.

Below is a very elegant duck, a male pintail, with a sweep of white up its neck and the characteristic slim, pointed tail feathers. They were right over the other side of the scrape so my photo is enlarged and heavily cropped and thus a bit grainy.

Moorhens (not really ducks) are quite common but lovely to see, darting busily about. The males, close up, have attractive subtle colourings with a grey-blue belly and brown back. Their red and yellow beak is distinctive. 

Swan Lake

Leighton Moss RSPB reserve had a large number of mute swans, huge and beautiful birds. The reserve's conservationists appear to have increased the number of small islands in some of the pools, to provide nesting sites. Some cormorants (and gulls) were roosting there too. The duck in the foreground with its head submerged is a wigeon, rather an attractive duck with a blue beak.

Egrets

Hello... What's that, creeping through the reeds? Wow, it's a great white egret. They are uncommon in the UK, though more have been seen lately, overwintering here from Europe. I only saw this one and another flying, though I was told there were three on the Leighton Moss reserve. As big as our native grey heron, they are white with a yellow bill and black feet.

Rather more common are little egrets, first recorded here in the late 1980s. These are increasing in number and are now breeding in the south of England. In the photo below, I captured both the great white and a little egret, showing the big difference in their size. (The ducks in front are shovelers, with that very heavy bill that gives them their name.)

Little egrets have black bills and legs but yellow feet. The photo below shows its plume rather nicely. My lens isn't really long enough for bird photography. There were several chaps with cameras and huge lenses in the hide - but I can't carry all that around!

Leighton Moss

The area around Arnside Knott, across the water on my photo yesterday, is Arnside and Silverdale, designated an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, but often overlooked in favour of the nearby and much better known Lake District National Park.

Tucked away within Arnside is one of my favourite places, the RSPB reserve of Leighton Moss, a huge expanse of wetland, reedbeds and woodland. It has a very attractive visitor centre and café, which has been much improved over recent years with landscaping and planting to the rear, designed to attract insects and birds. On a sunnier day, I would have enjoyed just sitting out there. There is a bird feeding area, visited by lots of small birds.

I was keen, though, to walk the paths to the many hides among the extensive reedbeds. It never fails to disappoint, and there is always much to see, both common birds and rarer species. There are usually marsh harriers here, gliding over the reedbeds - such a thrill to watch.

A recent development has been the construction of a tall viewing platform, giving panoramic views over the whole reserve.

RSPB = Rare Sights Produce Bliss

I visited one of my favourite wild places at the weekend - Leighton Moss RSPB Reserve. Hidden away down country lanes, it's a wonderful haven of reedbeds and lagoons, not far from Morecambe Bay and the southern end of the Lake District.  There are peaceful paths through reeds and woodland and a few well-placed hides with panoramic views over the lagoons.  Despite only having an ancient pair of binoculars, I still saw a good number of bird species as well as some red deer. I was thrilled to watch three harriers swooping about. They are beautiful birds. I am pretty sure I identified them as marsh harriers - the two males had very distinctive patterns of black wingtips, then grey bands and then brown patches close to their bodies. A male bullfinch thrilled me with its brilliant colours. I also saw my favourite little bird - that pink and grey bundle of fluffiness, the long-tailed tit. Leighton Moss is famous for being a breeding area for the elusive and rare bittern. I have never seen one but I did hear their curious booming sound, like someone blowing over the neck of a bottle. No bird photos, as I don't have the huge lens necessary for good wildlife photography - and anyway I just like quietly watching and enjoying the stillness in a place like that. Despite the very overcast weather, I had a blissful day out.