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16 Jun 2008

The Birds and the Bees.

No, not a relection on procreation but Bee's as in Bee Orchids. A beautiful flower and something to photograph that doesn't fly off or move! I found these beauties on one of my local walks at the weekend. Just as well really as there weren't many birds to look at! There were eight plants in an area where I've never seen them before but always thought looked an ideal habitat. I now know of three colonies in the area.




The only bird of note locally was the escaped Harris Hawk that seems to be shacked up with a Common Buzzard and can be seen along the A41 between Backford and the intersection with the A5117. Any young produced are going to result in some very interesting sightings later in the year. This bird seems to be fairing well and has been on the run from at least November 2007.

Using my Audobon bird caller to call out a Sylvia warbler that flew across the path in front of me and dived into a field of Wheat had an unexpected result. After only a few seconds 'squeaking' a Weasel ran out of the hedgerow towards me until realising its error and shot off with Molly in pursuit.

News of a Red-necked Phalarope at Neumans flash raised the pulse momentarily until the realisation that it had flown off never to be seen again. Or has it? I'm writing this from a hotel in Tonder, Denmark but news from Cheshire is that this mornings sighting of the R-n Phalarope is probably total b*llocks and someone has misidentified the juvenile Black-winged Stilt that looks like and acts like a Phalarope when swimming.........................

With local birds in short supply I decided to travel the short distance to Inner Marsh Farm RSPB in the hope an unusual wader may have turned up there. There were plenty of waders about with the now customary flock of summering Black-tailed Godwits numbering close to 500+. Amongst them and visible only from the bench and therefore a long way off, were singles of Little-ringed PLover, Greenshank and a stunning summer plumaged Spotted Redshank. Late passage birds or returning non-breeders?

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