22.5.10 Sweet Summery Days :)

Having been repeatedly foiled by lectures and dull weather, this weekend finally provided some free time and gorgeous weather for me to scoot over to the wetland centre. With clear blue skys, a strong sun and light breezes, I was expecting a production day by the lakes. Having arrived at 930, I headed straight for my hide-of-choice at the wader scrape. As a pootled along, I snapped my first two finds of the day - a reed warbler (not uploaded - he was hiding fairly deep in the reeds) and this juvenile long tailed tit.

Having gotten off to a good start, my luck began to run out. Whilst pulling up a bench in the hide, a tern dramatically swooped overhead and dived into the lake directly infront of me. Was my camera ready? No. Did the tern hang around? No. Instead, I managed a snap a few frames of a black headed gull as it flew past.

Unusually, the wetland centre was really really quiet today. Time rolled by with very little activity in either the wader scrape or main lakes. The exceptions to this rule, were of course the sand martins who at least provided a wonderful spectacle even if they are too small and speedy to photograph! In a rare flurry of activity, I did manage to catch this goose as it took off from the lake, running across the waters surface to pick up speed.

To match the relaxed mood on the wetlands, a duck with her chicks sauntered by the water scrape hide. With such gorgeous spring weather about, I couldn't resist putting at least 1 duckling picture in my blog :D quaaaaack.

With time marching on, I was beginning to gather myself up to head home for some more hours of revision, when I got a little reward. The tern was back, and stayed just long enough this time for me to catch a snap as he hovered briefly about the water scanning for fish. These sleek migrants are truly a pleasure to watch bring back many happy memories for me - I used to watch them in Stevenage where they nest on the lake nr the town centre. The picture at the bottom is one I took there 2 years ago as one of a pair returned from a fishing trip :)