A Milestone at Upton Warren

In Wednesday last week we made an afternoon trip to Upton, hoping that the Bairds Sandpiper had not been disturbed by the work being done at the Flashes. Luckily for us the work was hardly noticeable, with just a bald head popping up out of the reeds every now and then.

The Sandpiper showed really well, but never got very close;

The milestone mentioned in the title, well that's out 800th species since we started recording what we have seen. I have to say though that if someone hadn't worked out what this bird was and we had been on our own, I would probably have put it down as a Stint. Still struggling with wader identification, especially in non-breeding colours.

A real highlight of the day, was from a bird that both Tina and me love, and that's the Curlew. There were a group of about 20 in front of the hide, calling quite often, which for us is one of the best avian sounds that there is;

Another great bird showing well was the Ruff, very busy fattening up,

There were also a few Snipe about,

The last couple of Avocets were also pretty busy,

Lapwing and Teal numbers were up from our last visit back in July with the Lapwings making a circuit now and then. After a couple of hours we decided to have half an hour at the Moors before heading home for tea.

We went straight to the Water rail hide hopefully for the Kingfisher and even before I sat down Tina saw it on one of the branches over the water, but he flew off just as I go the camera pointed. Never mind at least we had a good view. Otherwise it was quite quiet, adding Cormorant, Common Sandpiper, Little Grebe and Swans to our sightings for the day.

As always visiting Upton is a real pleasure, we keep saying we must get there earlier, perhaps this week?