Deleted

I received a text yesterday from Craig asking if I had noticed that the link to my blog from the local bid club's website had been removed. I hadn't noticed as I never look at the links. Presumably it has been removed because I dared to criticise their beloved 'Yearlist Challenge' which is supported by a mega 10% of the clubs membership! Oh dear, it would seem that they have spat their dummy out. Rather typical I'm afraid. Anyway enough of this nonsense and on to today's birds or once again lack of them.

It was too windy to do any ringing at the 'obs' this morning so I decided to have a look off Rossall Point as there was a high tide at 10:00 a.m. and I knew it would be running from about six. I was at Rossal for just after six and the first bird I had as I walked onto the prom was a Whimbrel flying along the beach. Nice start I thought; let's hope it gets better. It didn't.

 Alongside the Coastguard's Tower

I got myself in a position alongside the Coastguard's Tower and watched and waited and watched. It's probably just as easy for me to list everything I had, rather than try to weave some elaborate tale around it. At sea I had 79 Cormorants (not a bad count), 2 Eiders, 9 Sandwich Terns, 6 Common Scoters, 2 Manx Shearwaters, 6 Gannets and a dark morph Arctic Skua. At one stage the Skua was being mobbed by a Sandwich Tern, rather than the other way round.

Waders included 199 Oystercatchers, 4 Redshanks, 15 Dunlin, 2 Curlews and a Turnstone. Vis was virtually non-existent other than a few Swallows that at one stage were mobbing a Sparrowhawk as it drifted over the golf course.

As usual I called in at Fleetwood Marsh 'dog toilet', sorry Nature Park, on my way home. A lady with several dogs of course (why can't people just have one dog these days) asked me if I was looking for anything special. I wanted to say chance would be a fine thing with all you idiots running around but I decided not to lower myself. Instead I just ignored her. I did take the picture below of the 'dog shit' bin and reported it to the Ranger as it is absolutley disgusting. Why can't these ignorant filthy people take their dog's crap home with them, rather than leaving it to the poor Ranger to clear up?!

Out on the pools there were just 13 Coot, 2 Little Grebes, 5 Tufted Ducks, 10 Mallards, Pochard, Moorhen and Mute Swan. Wow!

I am keeping a careful eye on the forecast at the moment in the hope that the wind will drop enough for us to be able to do some ringing tomorrow. I'll let you know.

Oh, I nearly forgot; I went back to Freckleton Marsh on Thursday to have a look at the completed ditching work and it is looking good. I have included a couple of pictures of the ditches below, but you need to imagine them full of water with Lapwing and Redshank chicks feeding alongside them.