Fancy A Sandwich?

I woke up once or twice on Saturday night with the wind rattling the trees and rain hitting the window. So Sunday morning I headed out to Knott End to watch the tide in and look for overnight strays. The morning was pretty grey as well as blustery, my cameras on a less than ideal ISO800. 

I think the wind had sent the small birds to the shelter of upriver as I could muster only 6 Redshank, 4 Dunlin and 7 Bar-tailed Godwit, although the sturdier Curlews hung around on the beach until the tide eventually forced them upriver too. By high tide just 90 Oystercatcher remaining with another 300+ having left as the Wyre channel filled. 

Terns were the stars of the show, many arriving with the tide, some soon leaving in the direction of Fleetwood, others staying put near the jetty and yet more heading east to the roost along the shore. A number of the terns took the opportunity to carry on feeding in the shallow waters at the edge of the tide. In all I estimated 170 Sandwich Terns and 30+ Common Terns in a couple of hours watch. 

After the Lapwings on Friday it was the terns turn to suffer the “dreads” today. A gang of 60 or 70 rested on the sands until every now and then the whole lot would erupt into the air, fly around for a minute or so and then land back on the beach. Their panic made me look around for a skua or maybe a Peregrine, but there seemed to be nothing to generate such a hubbub. There are three or four Common Terns mixed in with the 60+ Sandwich Terns in the picture below.

"Click the pics" for a full sized Sandwich.

Sandwich Terns and Common Terns

Sandwich Tern

Sandwich Tern

Sandwich Tern

 Sandwich Tern and Black-headed Gull

Black-headed Gull

The Black-headed Gulls aren’t the only ones after a meal at Knott End. Like at most seaside towns the gulls learn that cars = people = hand outs and each large gull defends a feeding territory by employing both noise and threats. 

  Lesser Black-backed Gull

More birdy snacks from Another Bird Blog soon.