Sunday, November 14, 2010

Morning has broken...



Sometimes its not just about the birds...We called in to see if we could get our own photo's of the Alnwick Great White Egret first thing this morning. And what a morning. The sun through the mist, in the shadow of a medieval castle, what more could you want.

There, down below, as close as yesterday, was the egret, casually sitting in the dead reedmace stems. A vision in white...




After a short while here, we headed off the Branton to do Johns WeBs count.

As usual, plenty of interest here between Branton and Hedgely Pits. Loads of wildfowl - 127 Mallard, 90 Teal, 104 Wigeon, 7 Goldeneye, 23 Goosander, 85 Tufted Duck, 1 drake Pochard, 200 Greylag and 40 Canada Geese, 3 Little Grebe, 1 Green Sandpiper and 3 Kingfishers, including two fighting.

On the river, 3 Dippers were already in song and a few large Salmon sploshed in the pools.  2 Buzzard flew over and a male Sparrowhawk soared overhead.

This evening, a report on the pager said that 60 Waxwings were at Branton at 9.30am? We missed those...

6 comments:

Warren Baker said...

Aw shut up about Waxwings Stewart !!!!

Great pics of the castle, it was just gloom, fog and then rain for us today :-(

Wilma said...

What a vision to start the day - the landscape and the white egret.

the word verification is "excidedf". appropriate, no?

abbey meadows said...

Nice shots Stew, lovely bird, Berwick and Hexham have had Litle Egrets so it's all square!

Stewart said...

Warren - Pfff....yawn...nice day here until about 3pm.

Wilma - Thank you...

Nigel - If this was a card game, Morpeth would win....

James said...

Great shot considering the light. The lanscape pics look cinematic mind!

Anonymous said...

I agree, superb photos Stewart.

Still only the one Waxer for me so far. Maybe this cold snap might bring some closer to home.