{"id":1323,"date":"2011-09-19T13:06:26","date_gmt":"2011-09-19T13:06:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/?p=1323"},"modified":"2011-09-19T13:06:26","modified_gmt":"2011-09-19T13:06:26","slug":"roost","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/birdwatching\/roost","title":{"rendered":"Roost"},"content":{"rendered":"

Friday was our fourth Druridge Bay<\/a>\/southeast Northumberland safari of the week, and it was a real pleasure to meet up with Lawrie and Linda, 2 of our returning clients from last year.<\/p>\n

We started with a specific request; Brown Hare<\/em><\/strong>.\u00a0 In the strong wind, persistent drizzle\u00a0and biting cold they were keeping their heads down…all except for one which raised it’s ears, and then it’s head, above the stubble before demonstrating a remarkable vanishing act.<\/p>\n

In Newbiggin Bay, with a big menacing sea breaking in the background, a flock of Pale-bellied Brent Geese<\/em><\/strong> flew north as we watched the Turnstones<\/strong><\/em>, Ringed Plover<\/strong><\/em>, Redshanks<\/strong><\/em> and Sanderling<\/strong><\/em> on the edge of the surf.<\/p>\n

Fields of Curlew<\/strong><\/em>, and fighting cock Pheasants<\/strong><\/em>, provided additional entertainment as we drove down the coast.\u00a0 I’d decided on East Chevington as our final destination of the trip and, as we arrived and began walking down to the North Pool, it looked as though the weather\u00a0might get the better of us.\u00a0 The wind was strengthening and the first few drops of rain began to fall as\u00a0a juvenile Merlin<\/em><\/strong> raced across the fenceline in front of us looking, in the fading light, like an\u00a0oversized hirundine.\u00a0 The evening roost on the pool was building and hundreds of Great Black-backed<\/strong><\/em>, Lesser Black-backed<\/strong><\/em>, Herring<\/strong><\/em>, Black-headed<\/strong><\/em> and Common<\/strong><\/em> Gulls<\/strong><\/em> were sitting in the shallow water with Sandwich Terns<\/strong><\/em>, Lapwings<\/strong><\/em>, Knot<\/strong><\/em>, Teal<\/strong><\/em>, Mallard<\/strong><\/em>, Wigeon<\/strong><\/em>, Shoveler, Coot, Moorhen<\/strong><\/em>\u00a0and Canada<\/strong><\/em> and Greylag Geese<\/strong><\/em>.\u00a0 Then Pink-footed Geese<\/em><\/strong> and more Greylag Geese<\/em><\/strong> began arriving, and the 4 Snow Geese<\/strong><\/em> that we saw last Sunday flew in to join the throng.\u00a0 A wave of panic spread through the roost, and many of the birds lifted into the air as a Bittern<\/em><\/strong> flew from one reedbed to another.\u00a0 Eventually, even the silhouettes began to merge into the darkness and the birds began to settle as we left the hide and braved the driving rain.\u00a0 With the footpaths and roads now covered in puddles the walk to the car, and the drive back to Alnwick, featured lots of Common Frogs<\/strong><\/em> and Common Toads<\/strong><\/em>, as well as a Tawny Owl<\/strong><\/em> that was perched on a fence post next to a line of trees.<\/p>\n

It was a great experience to enjoy some pretty awful weather, and some superb wildlife, with Lawrie and Linda.\u00a0I’ll never get fed up with what\u00a0we do, and the weather is all a par tof the tapestry of that.<\/p>\n

Thanks for the chocolates \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Friday was our fourth Druridge Bay\/southeast Northumberland safari of the week, and it was a real pleasure to meet up with Lawrie and Linda, 2 of our returning clients from last year. We started with a specific request; Brown Hare.\u00a0 In the strong wind, persistent drizzle\u00a0and biting cold they were keeping their heads down…all except […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,9,5,139],"tags":[167,271,57,506,319,277,62,270,172,375,505,143,334,499,171,56,198,108,504,392,358,224,80,223,269,501,78,169,359,181],"class_list":["post-1323","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-birdwatching","category-druridge","category-northumberland","category-southeast-northumberland","tag-bittern","tag-black-headed-gull","tag-brown-hare","tag-canada-geese","tag-common-frog","tag-common-gull","tag-common-toad","tag-coot","tag-curlew","tag-great-black-backed-gull","tag-greylag-geese","tag-herring-gull","tag-knot","tag-lesser-black-backed-gull","tag-mallard","tag-merlin","tag-moorhen","tag-pale-bellied-brent-goose","tag-pheasant","tag-pink-footed-geese","tag-redshank","tag-ringed-plover","tag-sanderling","tag-sandwich-tern","tag-shoveler","tag-snow-goose","tag-tawny-owl","tag-teal","tag-turnstone","tag-wigeon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1323","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1323"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1323\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1324,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1323\/revisions\/1324"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1323"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1323"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1323"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}