Easy birding

We spent a very relaxing five days in Suffolk this week (including a trip to the Olympics on tuesday). Like last visit, I somehow didn't have much time to do any substantial birding. However, we visited Minsmere with my parents on wednesday, and although we didn't do the scrape or levels (where a Pec Sand turned up on Lucky Pool!), we had a nice walk out to Island Mere, via Bittern Hide; this lived up to its name, with 3 Bittern sightings in the space of 15 minutes! I couldn't rustled up the Ferruginous Duck at Island Mere itself (I know this bird has been 'elusive'), but did have two plant ticks; Red-tipped Cudweed (in a little fenced-off area next to the path), and Round-leaved Wintergreen (next to the ramp up to Island Mere hide) - both usefully signed. Both are scare plants - see Plantlife's website for some info on the cudweed, and BSBI's online distribution maps for both the cudweed and the wintergreen. Several Purple Hairstreaks were also seen near the visitor's centre.


Red-tipped Cudweed at Minsmere

On thursday evening I had a wonder down to my old patch on the Orwell, checking out the saltings at Crane's Hill, at the northern end of Shotley Marshes. It was just after high tide, and there were quite a few nice birds in evidence; 1 Spotted Redshank, 2 Ruff, 3 Greenshank, 2 Common Sands, 4 Whimbrel (one on the deck and three over), an Avocet, several smart Grey Plovers, Turnstones and Black-wits, and 11 Med Gulls, plus 2 Marsh Harriers and a Cetti's Warbler. Nothing spectacular, but if I'd seen all those species on a trip to Collingham or Mons Pool, I would be over the moon! It just makes me realise how lucky (and spoilt) I was growing up and cutting my birding teeth in this area. 



Spotted Redshank and Ruff at Shotley Marshes

Grey Plovers at Shotley Marshes

Whimbrel at Shotley Marshes

Dark Bush-cricket at Shotley Marshes

Crayfishing

I did something a bit different on sunday, going out with the Notts Crayfish Group to look for our native White-clawed Crayfish in a stream near Mansfield. White-claws can still be found in several watercourses in the west of the county, but there survival is rather uncertain , as they are threatened by the presence of the invasive non-native Signal Crayfish which occur  in the east of the county, and the west in Derbyshire; Signals compete with our White-claws and carry a plague to which the White-claws succumb.

We had a successful day, catching 26 White-claws between us (under licence - they're a protected species). These were mainly juveniles, but also one large adult. The only down side was that I didn't have any time left afterwards to do any birding!

White-clawed Crayfish (in a bucket)