Crosprey

On Sunday morning I went out for a couple of hours with SH. We headed north to Warkworth Lane to try and find the elusive Common Crane, which had been hanging around.
After our initial scan produced nothing we walked down the lane past the caravan site and through the woods. Numerous Tree Sparrows were calling around us and three Buzzards soared over the woods.
After noticing a distant group of Whooper Swans we soon spotted the Crane standing amongst them. Although we were a long way from the group they looked very nervous and kept standing up and moving further away. There were a lot of people and dog walkers up and down the lane and it looked as if the Crane would fly at any moment.

We quickly checked Cresswell Pond next which was dead. 5 minutes after we left to go to Druridge Pools Steve got a call saying that just the Crane had flown over the hide at Cresswell before flying west.

Druridge pools wasn’t much better than Cresswell with the highlight being a pair of Pintail on the Budge field. The ponies (I don’t know if they are Exmoor or not), on the Budge field have done a good job of grazing around the pool; I hope the ones at Arcot can do the same.

Yesterday it was back to the drawing board, literally, doing my final work for university when I got a call from JM saying that he was watching an Osprey circling over the Holiday Inn between Seaton Burn and Arcot!
Rather than rushing there to find that it had gone, I headed to West Hartford on the off chance that it would follow the River Blyth like one did a year ago today.
Soon I was at the brick building with my scope scanning over the river. I stayed nearly 2 hours but there was no sign although Grey Heron, LBB Gull and Lapwing were doing their best Osprey impressions as they flew over.

Not much was on the pools but 2 Short Eared Owls hunted over the marshy fields and a Buzzard flew west. The highlight though was a male Peregrine, which landed on the top tier of the pylon behind the WH farm. It stayed for 10 minutes or so before gliding down out of sight. I then spotted it later on chasing Wood Pigeons west over the river.

Through the week Wood Pigeon, Blackbird, Jackdaw, Magpie, Dunnock and House Sparrow have all been collecting nesting material in my garden and the shed has been invaded by mice.