1530 hrs at Cold Edge Dams in a brisk S>4 and specks of rain as dark clouds rolled over.
Only a slight area of shoreline in the SE corner of Leadbeater Dam and the beach at the boat launching area of Haigh Cote dam. Nothing but Mallards on the top dam whilst Leadbeater Dam held 3 Common Sandpiper, 2 Redshank and 2 Oystercatchers with a pair of Tufted duck on the water. Swifts were everywhere along with Swallows, probably helped along with the south wind but nothing else exciting coming through.
I was going to miss Fly Flatts today but being close and cloudy skies the magnetic pull got me so off I went. As always at Fly I had a pleasant hours walk about although the birds were the same as yesterdays visit apart from 3 Dunlin which flew fast and low across the water from the west banking to the east.
No chance of photos today with the sky as black as night as large dark clouds rolled over the moor bringing light rain showers for a time . Snipe were noisy this evening with at least 4 chipping from the reed beds on the moor whilst Lapwings were up busily warning off everything that moved.
A pair of Wheatear that stayed behind when others had left had me thinking they were going to breed in the area even selecting a small burrow but after watching them for about 2 weeks they have finally given up the idea and moved on , not being seen for 3 days now.
On a sad note, the early morning and evening visits I have been making lately have failed to produce a single Short Eared Owl whereas 2 years ago we had 5 breeding pairs in the area . Now all the adult birds and young have disappeared under suspicious circumstances, its hard to believe that they would all have moved on out of the area.
As I was leaving a Cuckoo was calling from what sounded like the Castle Carr area but sound travels up there so it could even have been in the Luddenden valley.
The Nolstar field just held 2 Curlew and a Pied Wagtail.
BS