20200918 Brown Shrike, Warham Greens

 

20200921 Brown Shrike
Early morning sun and ultimate bokeh.
The second bite of the cherry often produces results... artistically speaking...

20200906 White-winged Black Tern, Cantley Sugar Beet Factory

 

20200906 Cantley Sugar Beet Factory
SE Lagoon, Excellent site for waders, terns and wagtails...

20200906 White-winged Black Tern
Upperparts and head on.
Difficult flight shooting as bird zipped about. 

Best fix settings in Manual mode, except focusing and sort out exposure in Adobe back at base.

20200906 White-winged Black Tern

20200906 White-winged Black Tern

20200906 Ww Black tern
Underparts against sky.

20200906 Ww Black Tern
Underparts against water.

20200906 Ww Black Tern
Flew about hunting over lagoons all day until 1530hrs...

20200906 Peregrine Falcon
Family about tallest chimney.

20200906 Yellow Wagtail
Male Motacilla flava flava
Briefly passed lagoon with a flock of  c10 flavissima

20200906 Yellow Wagtail
Moved through with above bird.

20200906 Curlew Sandpiper
2 juveniles here and unaware of humanoids.

20200825 Sea-watching Sheringham Prom & Cley Beach

20200825 European Shag

One juvenile keenly hunted around the breakwater rocks, Sheringham.

20200825 European Shag

2 birds flew in from East in heavy rain.

20200826 European Shag
Leaping about on the rocks in a stiff Westerly this morning.

20200826 European Shag
Wing tip more rounded than Cormorants below, and shows a pale coverts panel.
This bird unfortunately shows a Cormorant like kink in its neck.... 

20200826 Cormorant
1st winter bird in foreground.
Note sloping forehead, thicker neck and heavy bill.

20200826 Caspian Gull
1st winter bird.

Feeding inshore along Sheringham Prom.

20200826 Caspian Gull

Overall paler mid-tones than juvenile LBB with a striking near white head.

20200826 Black Tern

Juvenile West and into high wind, inshore past Cley Beach. 

 

20200829 Long-tailed Skua
Pale morph West, Cley Beach.
Dwarfed by passing Fulmars and lobster pot flag.

20200829 Long-tailed Skua
Off white breast and belly. Blunt tail spike.

20200829 Long-tailed Skua

Off white nape shows well. Two white primary pins just show.

20200823 Icterine Warbler Grambore Hill

 

20200823 Willow Warbler

12 plus in clump, all olivish-yellow base colour. 

20200823 Icterine Warbler

Open face and large black eye.

20200823 Icterine Warbler

Faint yellow tint to central breast and face.

20200823 Icterine Warbler

20200813 Albino Grey Heron, 'Gandalf The White' Walsey Hills & NFWood Roosts

20200812 Little Egret
72 birds into NFWood roost this evening.

20200812 Little Egret
Post breeding moult in evidence.

20200831 Great White Egret
On Snipes Marsh and for comparison only...

Thin legs with dull yellow tibia, blackening onto tarsus.
Overall a clean bright zinc white, helped by bright sunlight.

20200813 Albino Grey Heron
In flight and at distance the bird is consistently mis-identified. 
Check the shorter leg extension than GWEgret and overall buff off white plumage.

                                                          

20200813 Albino Grey Heron
Attempting GWEgret pose.

20200813 Albino Grey Heron
Form, posture and feather topography of Heron.

20170331 Great White Egret
Bayfield Lake.
Long leg extension and 'knee' almost at tail tip.

 20170331 Great White Egret

Biro sketch, Bayfield Lake.
Thin and lanky.

20200813 Albino Grey Heron
Over NFWood
Shorter leg extension, more compact.

20000923 Great White Egret

Pair over the Hale Estuary Cornwall Sept 2000 when they were rare.

Note huge leg extension noted...

20170331 Great White Egret
Bayfield Lake.

20200804 White-tailed Eagle, Burnham Thorpe

 

20200804 White-tailed Eagle

Tagged immature bird from the Isle of White project.

The WTE over Burnham Thorpe this morning was G393, a male released on the IOW last August. AugustIt spent much of spring and early summer in N.Yorkshire before heading south to the E.Midlands on July 20 , then east to Norfolk on Sat.

20200804 White-tailed Eagle

With CBuzzard which has the wing span of one Wt Eagle wing...

20200804 White-tailed Eagle

Upperparts and the beginnings of a white tail.

20200804 White-tailed Eagle

With 2 Red Kite, the species which most frequently mobbed the Eagle.

Red Kite abundant in Burnham Thorpe area, 14 birds up over the village at one point today.

20200521 The Walsey Hills Hedge

RSPB Gamebird shooting survey results:
https://community.rspb.org.uk/cfs-file/__key/communityserver-blogs-components-weblogfiles/00-00-03-96-75/6366.7288.RSPB-Members-Infographic.pdf



Is this Wildlife Crime? Or just Disturbance? 

A local wildlife notable who has spent decades working in conservation and wildlife crime has assessed the situation and appeals to the Cley Bird Club:

'I would welcome your views as this is one of the worst cases of habitat destruction I have seen in the Cley area since moving here 23 years ago and the CBC does have in its aims: have a voice on local issues affecting wildlife.'

The Norfolk Wildlife Trust and Norfolk Ornithologists Association should also voice concerns, as the hedge remains and fence abut their reserves.

https://www.cxcs.co.uk/hedge-cutting-dates/

The importance of hedgerows has featured several times on this years Springwatch.
 The remains of this one demonstrates the reality of todays countryside and its management.

20200521 Walsey Hills end.

5m on west side of hedge removed.

Removed in mid May...??

Making way for fencing, hunting and shooting...?
RSPB survey on game shooting; I guessed at 10 million gamebirds dumped in the British countryside each year...
Turns out its over 57 million?! Its rumoured 20% in TG04.

20200521 The Hangs end.

10m metres wide hedge removed leaving thin strip of Alexander.
How many Whitethroat nests were wiped out?
How has this helped our carbon footprint and re-wilding of the Cley Square?
Please view Mark Golley's twitter feed:

https://twitter.com/Vaasetter/status/1262718800841134080

20140423 Walsey Hills from The Hangs

A lush and wide hedge in late April 2014 that runs for about 1.5Km down to Walsey Hills... now no more??

20130922 Red-backed Shrike

Frequented the hedge for several days in autumn of 2013.

Many birds first landfall in the Hills are relocated up this hedge line.

20181012 Redstart

Autumn migrant deep in the hedgerow.

20181012 Red-legged Partridge

Here is part of the issue, gamebirds on the footpath beside the hedgerow and avoiding the guns.

11 of 57million dumped in the countryside each autumn....


https://www.birdguides.com/news/wild-justice-case-against-gamebird-release-to-go-ahead

202000603 Fencing machine and fence.

Large part of perfectly good hedgerow removed here.

20200603 New Fence.

Why are public footpaths being fenced in over arable land?

20200603 New Fence.
From the lower end and stretching 1.5Km to The Hangs up the hill and through arable land...