Good conditions at Fly Flatts early morn with a light mist soon clearing leaving full cloud on a light NE>2 turning E>2 with odd bursts of sunshine through the cloud.
A really productive morning with at least 11 Common Sandpipers present as well as a single Dunlin and the usual Ringed Plovers, Redshanks and Oystercatchers whilst a Snipe flushed from the waters edge on the south bank and was later up drumming.
Greylags have excelled themselves this year with 3 pair now with goslings, 4, 5 and 7 with one of the parent birds being the white Greylag so could end up with more white geese, as long as they survive.
A female Mallard was escorting 9 very vulnerable ducklings which rarely survive up here with weasels on the ground and gulls and crows in the air. This morning, 8 LBB and 4 Herring gull were present whilst 7 Wheatear were around the south bank and compound.
The highlight of the morning was undoubtedly as I was scoping the western ridge when I picked up a very dark backed raptor low over the moor which, when it turned to my direction, was a cream crown Marsh Harrier quartering the ridge top but very distant. As I was watching it, a Short Eared Owl came into view mobbing the Harrier along with a Red Kite nearby. After a few minutes all 3 birds dropped over the west side of the ridge not to reappear. A few minutes later a Peregrine flew north above the ridge.
Each time I get a spring moving Marsh Harrier at either Fly Flatts or Leeshaw its always around the 1st May. The SEO is the first sighting of this species that I,ve had this year.
BS