Ever improving weather tends to make days out with clients slightly more relaxed than those days where we’re contending with the elements – although I personally prefer the more challenging days \ud83d\ude09<\/p>\n
I collected Julie and Mike from The Plough Inn<\/a>, not much more than a stone’s throw from the sea, and we set out for an afternoon and evening around Druridge Bay<\/a> and southeast Northumberland.\u00a0 The reedbeds were resonating with the song of Sedge Warbler<\/strong><\/em> and Reed Bunting<\/strong><\/em> as Chiffchaff<\/strong><\/em> and Willow Warbler<\/strong><\/em> were singing from the trees that had grown above the height of the hedgerows, Great Crested Grebes<\/strong><\/em> crossed the water with elegant grace and Mute Swan, Greylag Goose<\/strong><\/em> and Canada Goose<\/strong><\/em> kept a watchful eye on their fluffy babies.\u00a0 A hatch of flying insects had attracted the attention of Swallow, Sand Martin, House Martin<\/strong><\/em> and Swift<\/strong><\/em> as well as an impressive flock of Black-headed Gulls<\/strong><\/em> and at least six 1stSummer Little Gulls<\/strong><\/em>.\u00a0 The eerie cries of Curlew<\/strong><\/em> carried on the southerly breeze and Lapwing<\/strong><\/em> displayed so close that we could hear their wingbeats as well as the nuances of their remarkable calls.\u00a0 Just as remarkable, if not more so, was a Common Snipe<\/strong><\/em> ‘drumming’ impressively as it flew back and forth right in front of us while we were dazzled by a shockingly bright Yellow Wagtail<\/strong><\/em>.<\/p>\n With the sun appearing beneath the dark grey cloud layer as it neared the horizon, the landscape was suddenly bathed in extraordinary light.\u00a0 Intense greens and yellows contrasted with the subtle hues of areas still in shadow as a Barn Owl<\/strong><\/em> ghosted by on silent wings, a Grey Wagtail<\/strong><\/em> was flycatching from midstream rocks, a Grey Heron<\/strong><\/em> stalked the shallows and Mallard<\/strong><\/em> and Goosander<\/strong><\/em> swam downstream, carried on the rushing bubbling flow where insects trapped in the surface layer fell prey to hungry fish lunging clear of the water and briefly inhabitating an alien world before splashing back down into the watery darkness.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Ever improving weather tends to make days out with clients slightly more relaxed than those days where we’re contending with the elements – although I personally prefer the more challenging days \ud83d\ude09 I collected Julie and Mike from The Plough Inn, not much more than a stone’s throw from the sea, and we set out […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[97,271,57,560,268,373,172,378,488,283,256,190,232,123,93,171,397,178,536,127,218,227,217,233,213,552],"class_list":["post-3307","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-druridge","tag-barn-owl","tag-black-headed-gull","tag-brown-hare","tag-canada-goose","tag-chiffchaff","tag-common-snipe","tag-curlew","tag-goosander","tag-great-crested-grebe","tag-grey-heron","tag-grey-wagtail","tag-greylag-goose","tag-house-martin","tag-lapwing","tag-little-gull","tag-mallard","tag-marsh-harrier","tag-mute-swan","tag-pied-wagtail","tag-reed-bunting","tag-sand-martin","tag-sedge-warbler","tag-swallow","tag-swift","tag-willow-warbler","tag-yellow-wagtail"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3307","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=3307"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3307\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3309,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3307\/revisions\/3309"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3307"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3307"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3307"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}