Trip Out!

As it was mentioned in the Echo Article - I thought I'd drop a few snaps in for all to enjoy.
We managed to organise a "Cromwell photo club" outing & Bacon butties + a walk round North Cave Wetlands started the morning off.
There wasn't too much opportunity for snaps, but decent birding all the way around the site.

I managed a couple of shots of the Mute Swans coming in.

 

Then we set off over to Blacktoft Sands where things picked up a bit for snapping away. After visiting a few hides & finding the water bare we thought it may not be such a great day. We had been in Marshland, Xerox & First hide, Anything we had seen on first look in - had disappeared on the second, things were not looking too good. We all sat down in Townsend & enjoyed the Duck that were there.

Plenty of Teal, Wigeon & Shoveler were present, then they all left, leaving the water bare .....

 

 

 

Shoveler's we were enjoying

 

A Pheasant that ran around in front of the hide.

 

A Wigeon floating about.

 

We then realised why so many pools were empty - Just as all the birds took off & flew to the left - These appeared from the right.

 

Marsh Harriers - cleared out every pool they flew over - but as they moved across the site the birds came back to get away from them.

 

We also had a Male Hen Harrier zip past around our lunch time, then later on something appeared & the sites Scope club claimed Merlin! :

 

Look sat there, miles away in the tree?

 

 

Sorry It's a bit hard to see isn't it?

I did a bit of fiddling with the picture, cropping, sharpening etc &

 

 

Presto - There that's a bit better - Record shot of a Female Merlin? To be Honest after further inspection I am not 100% convinced that this particular birdie isn't a Kestrel.

You can make your own minds up!

 

 

UPDATE ; 11/02/15
I was looking through the RSPB Blacktoft recent sightings & noticed an interesting Picture of something .....
As I don't believe in nicking others pictures here's a link to that particular report for 10th
http://www.rspb.org.uk/community/placestovisit/blacktoftsands/b/blacktoftsands-blog/archive/2015/02/10/another-top-weekend.aspx

If you scroll down the page there is a Kestrel picture, & ignoring the poor light that day, you can compare the bird above to their Kestrel shot.

My Personal opinion - I think this is the same local bird a few weeks later under different light conditions.
But please do have your own opinion, with the extra evidence, it may be the same as mine .... or not!