On a warm muggy afternoon I collected Julie & Paul and Geoff and Minouche ahead of an afternoon and evening around Druridge Bay and southeast Northumberland…
Late July is often a time to watch waders, and after a riverside walk that produced good views of a Dipper we started working our way through the coastal pools. A Barn Owl was ghosting its way along a hedgerow as Little Egrets and Grey Herons stalked through the shallows, a Water Rail scurried between clumps of rush and an impressive array of waders was well appreciated; Avocet, Black-tailed Godwit, Curlew, Dunlin, Common Sandpiper, Green Sandpiper, Knot, Lapwing, Oystercatcher, Redshank and Ringed Plover were all roosting or feeding, a Spotted Redshank flew over, the trilling whistles of Whimbrel cut through the evening air and panic spread the the wader flocks as a male Marsh Harrier quartered the reedbeds and the precursors to the big Starling murmurations of the winter speckled the sky.