Patrington Haven

I've been to Pat Haven 4 times in the last week with very varying results.First couple of visits were pretty unsuccessful, plenty of waders but set up in the wrong place or arrived too late.
there was some good birds though including marsh harrier, short eared owl, kingfisher and curlew sandpiper being the best, along with whimbrel, curlew,ringed plover, green sandpiper, golden and grey plover, avocet, turnstone, dunlin, snipe, hundreds of swallows, and good sized flocks of yellow wagtails and goldfinches.
I went again this morning with curlew sandpiper as the target bird, I picked out a spot and waited.Pretty soon there were hundreds of waders whizzing about all over the place, including a pair of cs's right in front of me.
It was quite a spectacle for about an hour until the tide completely flooded the lagoon and they all dispersed.
I went on to the end of the track and it was full of swallows and yellow wagtails.
there was also a few waders roosting on the rocks but no sign of the massive flocks that were flying about as the tide came in.
Brid skua cruise tomorrow which is a first for me, will post details here tomorrow.















Hornsea Mere Pelagic

I went up to Hornsea mere again last night in the hope of some more shots of the little gulls.
The light was going to be an issue as thin cloud was hanging over there mere when I arrived.
I found out that there was an organised boat trip so seeing as the light was not good, I thought I'd tag along.
There was a few other local birders on board as we set off for the south bank.
A few common sandpipers feeding along the shore were the first birds on view followed by an extremely obliging juvenile spotted redshank.
Going further round the mere we saw plenty of little gulls streaming up and down along with a huge amount of cormerants, 3 herons and hundreds of coot.
We then headed for the spit near swan island and it was here we got our best views of the little gulls, thanks to our expert skipper he got us really close to the bank and it was here we saw a juvenile ruff and had a visit from another spotted redshank.
We continued on and went past a buoy with an extremely obliging common tern perched on top then after nearly 2 hours we headed back to dry land.
It was a most enjoyable evening, good company with a very priveledged access to a very special place.
If this was done on a regular basis (coupled with the frequent rarities that turn up at the mere at this time of year) it could be come very popular.