With near gale force winds up on the tops and heavy rain plus a kitchen waiting to be decorated I settled for a quick check at Ogden late afternoon, also knowing that DP had checked Fly Flatts in the morning picking up 1 Common Sandpiper.
Ogden was miserable with very dark skies and heavy drizzle on a SW>4 with nothing other than 3 Canadas and a few Mallard on the water.
By the time I had walked three quarters of the way round my hopes of migrants had gone with nothing other than Robins, Wrens and Dunnocks plus a few Tits.
Then suddenly a life saver, a small bird flew across the front of me and landed on a nearby tree trunk, Treecreeper. Treecreeper is one of my many bogus birds, mainly because I do very little woodland birding getting very little pleasure from raking through dark leafy trees trying to pick out one small bird, I,m a wide open space birder with plenty sky and water to search through. All the same, it was nice to get this bird just as I was thinking all was lost, the problem now was getting a photo in the deepest, darkest part of the trees.
With ISO set at the top and exposure at the bottom I waited for the bird to come to my side of the tree when amazingly another bird landed in the next tree followed by a third shortly afterwards. Looking over the wall behind me another 3 Treecreepers were present so there I was surrounded by 6 birds that I,m usually lucky to get 1 a year.
After 30 minutes and around 200 photos, mostly rubbish, I came away thinking at least I hadnt wasted my afternoon birding session.
Hopefully its back to the open spaces tomorrow.
BS