{"id":2647,"date":"2014-09-10T17:40:46","date_gmt":"2014-09-10T16:40:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/?p=2647"},"modified":"2014-09-10T17:40:46","modified_gmt":"2014-09-10T16:40:46","slug":"mini-beasting-bespoke-otter-safari-02092014","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/uncategorized\/mini-beasting-bespoke-otter-safari-02092014","title":{"rendered":"Mini-beasting; Bespoke Otter Safari 02\/09\/2014"},"content":{"rendered":"

It’s remarkable how often a theme seems to develop during a trip; flocks, migration, raptors, birds with similar names – all have happened over the last few years.<\/p>\n

I drove up to the Breamish Valley to collect Donna and Andy and we headed towards the coast and Druridge Bay<\/a> with the plan of spending the afternoon and evening birdwatching, finishing at what has been our most reliable Otter<\/strong><\/em> site this year (although a run of five successful trips eneded with our last two Druridge Bay safaris not producing any sightings of this enigmatic predator).\u00a0 Starting in the hills on a nice afternoon, I thought it would be good to search for Adders<\/strong><\/em>, and Andy’s sharp eyes produced the goods, with the smallest Adder<\/strong><\/em> that I’ve ever seen \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n

The afternoon continued with the waders we would expect – Ruff, Curlew, Lapwing, Redshank, Oystercatcher, Dunlin, Common Snipe<\/strong><\/em> – and one much more scarce, in the shape of two Little Stints<\/strong><\/em>.\u00a0 We had a rear-end view of a Spoonbill<\/strong><\/em> heading north and a Little Egret<\/strong><\/em> was stalking along the shallows.\u00a0 It may be a predominantly white bird, but it’s stunning in good light.\u00a0 Adult and juvenile Mediterranean Gulls<\/strong><\/em> were picked out from the roosting Black-headed Gulls<\/strong><\/em> and, as dusk approached, we settled into position to watch for Otters<\/strong><\/em>.\u00a0 A juvenile Marsh Harrier<\/strong><\/em> was quartering the reedbeds, Starlings<\/strong><\/em> were arriving to roost, with some murmuration, a Spoonbill<\/strong><\/em> flew in, magnificent in the sunset, then, in the fading rays of daylight, there was an Otter<\/strong><\/em> \ud83d\ude42\u00a0 Clearly a theme was developing, as this was a very small Otter<\/strong><\/em> cub.\u00a0 Eventually light levels reached the point where we decided to call it a day and head back northwest.\u00a0 The day’s theme continued, with a tiny Rabbit<\/strong><\/em> along the roadside, and then the final wildlife experience, on a day with wildlife and clients that reminded me so often why I love my job; a Barn Owl<\/strong><\/em> crossing the road ahead of us before perching in the beam of our headlights \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It’s remarkable how often a theme seems to develop during a trip; flocks, migration, raptors, birds with similar names – all have happened over the last few years. I drove up to the Breamish Valley to collect Donna and Andy and we headed towards the coast and Druridge Bay with the plan of spending the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[371,97,271,373,172,288,123,243,386,397,193,837,210,284,358,241,398,161],"class_list":["post-2647","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-adder","tag-barn-owl","tag-black-headed-gull","tag-common-snipe","tag-curlew","tag-dunlin","tag-lapwing","tag-little-egret","tag-little-stint","tag-marsh-harrier","tag-mediterranean-gull","tag-otter","tag-oystercatcher","tag-rabbit","tag-redshank","tag-ruff","tag-spoonbill","tag-starling"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2647","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=2647"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2647\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2649,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2647\/revisions\/2649"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2647"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2647"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2647"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}