Scratching A Living

It was a cool and grey start this morning and I knew not to expect much. But I wasn’t the only one at the Conder screen, Daisy was there to greet me.

Daisy

I stuck it out birding despite Daisy bringing her pal Brown Cow for a look too, both of them munching at the grass in front of me then using the timber as a scratching post. Mystery of the vandalism solved.

It was something of a Lapwing morning with many both on the pool, in the creeks and at the Glasson tide line. My count came to 250+ on Conder Pool, 150 in the adjacent creeks and 350+ at Glasson.

Lapwing

Flocks of Lapwings can be very wary, their frequent “dreads” this morning leading to noisy calling as they flew off in sudden attacks of panic. “Dread” is a term used to describe how birds take part in sudden waves of alarm – often for no reason apparent to the observer – the panic spreading very quickly through a flock of birds (especially waders) or a colony (especially gulls and terns). The birds rise and fly off together, usually returning to the same or a similar spot very soon, but the event is always accompanied by lots of alarm calls.

Click on the xeno-canto button to hear the Lapwings.

Lapwing

Other waders this morning - 2 Little Ringed Plover, 75 Redshank, 4 Common Sandpiper, 2 Snipe, 2 Curlew, 1 Spotted Redshank and 1 Greenshank.

Common Sandpiper

A mixed bag of non-waders - 1 Grey Heron, 2 Little Egret, 1 Cormorant, 5 Teal, 16 Canada Goose, 2 Pied Wagtail, 15 Goldfinch and 5 Grey Partridge.

Pied Wagtail

Canada Goose

The sharp eyed will have noted the report lacks Goldeneye on the pool. Worry not; it was at Glasson Dock hiding amongst 16 Tufted Duck and 40+ Coot. One Grey Heron in the usual location at the boating jetty.

A quiet couple of hours for Another Bird Blog and pretty hard finding the birds again. Log in soon for better times. 

Linking today to Camera Critters  and   Annni's Blog.