Cream Crown Marsh Harrier
Cormorant gets the prize.
Again ideal moving conditions so with Tern, Swift, Cuckoo and Whimbrel as target bird it was off to Leeshaw which can be good for all 4 but not today.
As I got out of the car the whole shebang of Lapwings, Curlews and even geese went up flying round madly so a grab of the bins and after a difficult search through the mass of birds I spotted what I suspected to be a Sparrowhawk very high over the moor.
As it got nearer I thought, thats no Sparrowhawk, so after a few other choice words I grabbed the camera out of the back of the car and fired away knowing it was a Harrier species but it was,nt until it had gone that I zoomed the camera in to reveal a cream crown Marsh Harrier, thats when I started dancing round the Maypole.!
The bird was heading SW to start with towards the Calder valley but ended up heading >N.
With some decent shoreline now at Leeshaw a few waders were being tempted down but otherwise it was down to the usual sp. with several Lapwing chicks present in the fields.
Marsh Harrier
5 Snipe...............over the moor
1m Teal
3 Common Sandpiper
2 Redshank
3 Oystercatcher
3 Little Ringed Plover
4 LBB gulls
sev Lapwing chicks
sev Swallows moving through >N
+ usual sp.
BS