Inland WEBS

With the usual WEBS counter for some of inland sites away, myself, SH, DM and IFo counted them on Sunday.
After a windy and uneventful count at Castle Island we headed inland to Angerton Lake near Hartburn. After avoiding the Red-Legged Partridges in the middle of the road we started the count. Resident species such as Mute Swans and Canada Geese were present along with returning Little Grebe, Oystercatcher and Curlew.

Next count was further inland at Rothley Lakes, a new site for me. Once we had fought our way through the plantation to get to the lakes we ended up counting Canada Geese, Canada Geese and more Canada Geese so it was swiftly onto our final inland site, Rayburn Lake. This was again another new site for me.
As we approached the lake which is rapidly drying up along its shore, probably due to the lack of rain and strong winds like on Sunday, two Whooper Swans flew off leaving only there Mute cousins behind.
Good numbers of Teal and Wigeon along with Lapwing and Curlew were also on the lake.

It still seemed firmly like winter in inland Northumberland which is much different from Cramlington at the moment as I have heard at least three singing Chiffchaff in the same area behind the Brockwell Centre over the last week.

Finishing the counts quicker than we had expected allowed us to time to visit East Chevington and the feeding station in front of the north hide. It didn't take long despite the wind for the Redpoll to appear. At first we could only see Lessers but then two obvious Mealy Redpoll appeared including once stunning Pink bird. Another joined them and two Bank Voles showed well under the feeders as he fed on the spilt seed.
Long Tailed Duck and the Red Necked Grebe were still present on the north pool.