Yorks and Lincs (4 Days Old - Forgot to press Publish Post)

Carole and I headed down to Yorkshire and Lincolnshire for a few days for our Wedding Anniversary.  We visited Blacktoft Sands, North Cave, Far Ings and Fairburn Ings.  The weather stayed dry but overcast at times but we still had a great time.   Blacktoft was a great place with many species.  The Black Tailed Godwit in fantastic plumage with the brick red looking amazing in the sun kept doing a couple of circuits of the pool then landing in the shallow pond then off again.

There was a load of Avocets on the reserve, at least 40+ most of them defending their territory very tenaciously.  Then there was the Marsh Harriers and when I saw at one stage 6 in the air at the same time time I was absolutely flabbergasted, when one went over to the pool where the Black Headed Gulls and Avocets were there was absolute mayhem which the Harrier seemed impervious to and just carried on flying.

 At another pool were 4 Spotted Redshanks in their glorious black plumage.

Other birds seen were Spoonbills (must be related to the ones up at Cresswell as they seemed to sleep the same amount of time), Little Egrets, Greenshanks, a Cuckoo was heard and seen down the western end of the reserve with 6 Hares and a Fox.   Up at North Cave the place was filled with birds and their young.  We did see a Wood Sandpiper and thought it must be a regular but later on we were informed it was probably as uncommon as it is up here.

At Far Ings there is some absolutely spectacular views of the Humber Bridge and even more great views of the numerous Warblers that abound throughout the Reserve.  We even managed to spot a Wood Warbler but didnt get any pics unfortunately unlike the guy standing 10m to our right who got some unbelievable ones

We only had a short time at Fairburn Ings on our return trip but it seems like a place I will no doubt visit again.  The chap on the desk gave us a map and sketched a quick route as we said we only had about an hour and he was adamant that we would see Kingfishers as they pop in every 10 mins or so (have heard that one before) so when we reached the screen and looked through there was a Kingfisher which flew off after 2 secs so we thought at least it was a note for the  books but a couple there said if you stay or come back there will be another along in a few mins, so we stayed and sure enough a couple of mins later it came back.  We then went for a walk and when we returned and looked through the screen just in time to see another one land on a stick about 10m away.