Crowded Beaches...

The hungry hoards.

A day off work is all the better when the weather is good, and today was just the job. Calm and sunny, very spring-like.

After a visit to Alnwick, I grabbed the gear and headed up to Low Newton, to see if there were any waders on the shore. And were there! The image above is just a fraction of the hoards as the tide washed rotting seaweed around freeing up juicy invertebrates that all the birds seemed to like. Further up the beach those awful black sandflies were swarming in clouds, so I kept nearer the water where possible.

Sitting on the sand as the tide pushed the wader flock closer is great fun, they run past only feet away and are constantly active...maybe they see me as a seal? Er, not a word from you lot...

Dunlin

Purple Sandpiper actually showing some purple...

Sanderling

There were 140+ Sanderling, 20+ Purple Sandpipers and a few Dunlin, Redshank, Turnstone and Oystercatchers as well as gulls, eiders and half a dozen Goldeneye.

This plane came over low, putting the birds on edge so I left them to feed...

Along at the scrapes and pool, were masses of wildfowl - 130+ Teal, 80+ Wigeon, lesser numbers of Mallard, Shelduck, Gadwall and Goldeneye. In with 50+ Greylags were 3 White-fronted Geese. This one was really going for it, calling constantly, a sound I cant recall hearing before, it was like a diver, doing that warbling and wailing thing quite unlike the sounds we're familiar with? 

White-fronted Goose having a 'gander'.

 The scrapes look excellent for the spring passage. It wont belong before the Yellow Wagtails and Wheatears are skipping around over it...