RSPB Loch Leven

 We paid one of regular visits to the RSPB reserve at Loch Leven this week. It was a nice calm bright day for a change, our last two visits it has been blowing a gale so the birds were keeping a very low profile.

This time was pleasingly different with lots going on, the Lapwings were very busy in front of the middle hide,

nice view of its bum!

and plenty of aerial activity too.

We saw our first Reed Bunting of the year

and the duck species count was high with Wigeon still around,

Teal, Goldeneye, Mallard, Gadwall, Tufted Duck, Shoveler and Shelduck

Great Crested Grebes were busy pairing up on the loch and also on the reserve pools, as were two Little Grebes. I have to say the improvements made in front of the middle hide to make it more suitable for the Lapwing are paying dividends, it looks great and seems to be attracting birds in numbers. The curlew seem to like it too:

We counted 75, but i'm sure there were more.

Then to cap it off a couple of Hare were spotted on the bee/butterfly meadow,

a great day.

Over 30 species in all!

Loch Leven - Burleigh Sands

 We hadn't been to Loch Leven for about a month, Fife is just so good with places to go that we can't get around to them all! Especially with going up to Caithness for a week as well.

Actually it was very quiet around the Loch so there's not that much to report, hundreds of Mute Swans of course along with new additions:

We did see our first Swifts of the year which was very nice:

With the nice weather it was good to see Butterflies about:

Small White:

and Small Tortoiseshell

We also saw some Orange Tip, but Didn't get a photo.

Apart from that a male Reed Bunting showed very well on the Broom;

We had a very brief glimpse of a Great Spotted Woodpecker, some House Martin, Chaffinch, Great Tits and Blue Tits, Lots of Mallard, Black-headed Gulls, Lesser Black-backed Gulls and a couple of Gadwall. But that was pretty much it apart from a gaggle of Greylag Geese as we arrived back at the car park.

Still the Swift brought us up to 121 for the year!

A Week in Somerset - Pastures New 2

So it's taken a while to continue what we got up to in Somerset, we have been up in Edinburgh visiting our wonderful daughter, much catching up (and drinking!) was done, but on with Somerset.

Our next new site (for us) was WWT Steart Marshes, about a 30 minute drive from where we were staying. In fact we visited twice as the first time the weather turned on us and we beat a hasty retreat. As for the reserve, hats off to the WWT. They had things well organised for social distancing, the hides were open, with hand gel at the entrances, seats 'roped' off so you couldn't get too close to one another and while we were in the hide we were politely evicted while one of the wardens came in and sprayed and wiped down. Brilliant! Even the toilets (one at a time) were open.

Having said that from the birding point of view it was quiet, but what can you expect in July. We did get a very distant Curlew Sandpiper, I did take some photos, but they were just a blurry dot, so not putting that up here!

We did get a noisy display from some Oysercatchers:

There were still quite a few Avocets about

and a Juvenile Peregrine stayed rooted to a fence post on the other side of the scrapes. There were also plenty of Hereon around:

Plus a male Reed Bunting giving it some welly!

There were quite a few Shelduck feeding the majority of them youngsters, but no longer ducklings.

Our plan was to the find the Black-winged Stilts over the other side of the reserve, as they would have been a first for us in the UK, but as we started out the wind got up and the rain started and as it was a fair walk to their nesting site, we decided to hold fire and come back in better weather. It wasn't the most productive day only 23 species seen, but Curlew Sandpiper and Skylark were our first for 2020.

As we drove away we looked at the map and thought we'd find somewhere on the coast for a late afternoon coffee, not knowing what we would find we picked Stolford, it took us about 15 minutes to get there by which time the weather had brightened again. Hey ho!

But what a cracking little spot, from up on the sea wall, with the tide out, we saw Curlew and Whimbrel, plenty of Oystercatchers and along the hedgerows behind us, Linnet, Twite, Goldfinch, Whitethroat, Wren, Starling and some House Sparrows. Then out in the bay there must have been circa 500 Shelduck bobbing about, way to many to count! The Whimbrel:

So a few days later in glorious sunshine we went back to Steart, there was not much to add from our first visit apart from the Black-winged Stilts, which were a long long way from the viewing platform, but at least we saw them.They were down among the Egrets so from this picture you can see how far away they were!

I'd much rather see them up close like we do in Lesvos, but sadly not this year. Perhaps next?

So just to finish this post and our visit to Steart, here are a few more photos:

Buzzard,

a Wall Butterfly,

Close up and personal with a Bull,

Mute Swans

and one of two Brown Hares to finish the day.

 

Belvide Nature Reserve

We decided after some years thinking about it! To join the West Midlands Bird Club, this gives us access to a number of private reserves within a 45 minute drive from home. Once we received our membership details, that contains the codes to access the reserves we took the short hop over to Harborne to check the reserve there out.

The reserve is tiny and is adjacent to the Harborne Walkway, having said that it's a nice place for a shortish walk. There are no hides but quite a few benches which we made good use of for a coffee or two of course. Now that we are getting in to late June the bird activity is a lot less, so not much was seen, the highlight being a family of at least 4 Goldcrest dancing around in the tree canopy above our bench, so getting a photo was nigh on impossible. I do have a blurry one, but I won't put that on here.

The only other photo was of a patrolling Buzzard:

So now on to the title of this post, Belvide NR, this another WMBC reserve not far from J12 of the M6. This reserve is based around the Belvide Reservoir, there are 6 hides, plenty of benches and two toilets (luxury!) To cover all 6 hides the walk from the car park and back is about 3 miles, which on a hot afternoon like yesterday was a bit tiring for us oldies. Also it's always strange sussing out a new place, because you don't know where anything is, luckily at the second hide we visited we had a nice socially distanced chat with a regular he gave us a rough idea of what was where.

So onto the birding bit.
Tufted Duck, of which there were plenty,

 Peacock Butterfly Catepillar,

 Common Terns,

 'Dancing' Lapwing,

 Common Tern,

 Great Crested Grebe,

 Ringed Plover,

 Pochard,

 Carrion Crow,

 Tufties and Coot,

 Reed Bunting going for it,

 I think this is a Buff Ermine Moth Catepillar, but I'm no expert, so sorry if I'm wrong.

 Juvenile Coot,

 Damoiselle,

 Young Tree Sparrow,

 Young Great Tit,

 Tree Sparrow,

 Sedge Warbler

 Red Admiral,

 Long-tailed Tit

 and Pheasants.

We had a lovely 4 hours or so there, taking our year tally up by 3 to 120 and 72 for the month, so not too bad.