19 July 10 Barons Haugh

A dull afternoon with a period of prolonged thundery rain.

The walk down to the Centenary Hide was uneventful apart from a single Common Sandpiper on the Clyde. From the hide waders comprised c30 Lapwing, 1 Black Tailed Godwit and 1 Common Sandpiper. 4 ferel Greylags were present. 100 Black Headed Gulls and 30-40 Lesser Black Backed was a good showing.

Ducks were mainly Mallard along with small numbers of Tufted Duck, Pochard and Gadwall. 2 Little Grebes were present.

A young Roe Deer appeared close to the Centenary Hide. Some images:

Scruffy Sedge Warblers were present in the same area:

17 July 10 Newton on Sea, Northumberland

Went with Louise to Northumberland. A bright day with occasional showers that completely died away as the day progressed. Wind was quite blustery.

We arrived at Newton on Sea just after 1pm after a wild goose chase round Haddington where a Quail had been reported singing at 8am. A complete waste of time and diesel !

Round at the lookout there were hundreds of Arctic Tern with young and a few Little Tern and 1 Sandwich Tern.

There were 2 Sanderling on the shoreline and a few Golden Plover flew past.

Some images from the day:

Stopped at St Abbs on the way home. Lots of Kittiwakes with young on the cliffs. All Auks appeared to be off the cliffs with only a few seen on the sea. Fulmars on the cliffs::

All in all a pretty average day. Hope Suffolk is better next week !

11 July 10 Barons Haugh

A dry and bright afternoon with a strong south west wind, although it was very present out of the wind.

Spent most of my time trying to photograph Spotted Flycatcher at the end of Chestnut Walk adjacient to the graveyard:

Also of interest were 6 Black Tailed Godwit and a Common Sandpiper from the Centenary hide. There were also 2 Redshank and c15 Lapwings. A single Dunlin was also reported.

04 July 10 Barons Haugh

The day had dawned wet and windy. In fact this was the first real rain we have had in weeks.

By early afternoon the skies had brightened but there was a strong south west wind and occasional showers.

The Haugh was predictably quite but nonetheless still held significant numbers of eclipse duck including Gadwall, Tufted and Pochard. 2 Great Crested Grebe were present and 2 or 3 Little Grebes. There were small numbers of Lapwing present. In its good times in the mid to late eighties, when Russell was the full time warden there was far more interest. Green Sandpipers were always present at this time of year and other passage waders were likely. There appears to be no real attempt to properly manage the reserve especially the water levels and evidence of 'neglect' is further enforced by untrimmed hedges and other vegetation severely obscuring the view from both the Marsh and Phoenix hides.

Female Goosander with young on the Clyde: