Tuesday 6 May 2014

Spoonbill at guess where? Carlton Marshes Scrape!

I went down this morning Tuesday 6 May, to the Carlton Marshes Scrape again, 4th time in as many days! I met Peter N & Chris M who jokingly said it had gone. They relented after a minute and said it was still there. I saw Andrew E & Jane & Wilton's Watchpoint and I could see the bird, a fine immature Spoonbill was on the middle of the Scrape asleep. My first Lowestoft Spoonbill! Occasionally it would wake up have a preen with its great spatular shaped bill (with pale cream scalloped tip at the end) and then fall asleep again, it showed a yellowish flush on the breast. Cuckoo was heard too. However it eventually woke up and promptly flew first east then north, as it flew we noted the black wing tips and black markings confirming it was an immature bird, we lost it behind trees where it was flying over Fisher Row's southerly marsh and then suddenly we had it again flying in from the north and practically over our heads it landed again on the Scrape and promptly started vigorously feeding with its spatular shaped bill moving it from side to side then sifting out the food by shaking its bill slightly, it kept feeding in this way for sometime. Meanwhile 3 then 5 and later around 14 Swifts seen from the Vistors centre car park. Back at the watchpoint, a Sedge Warbler was singing nearly often flying up into the air and returning to the same set of 3 bushes I managed to get a few pics of this before I walked back. Almost back to the Vistors centre and I heard a commotion Blackbirds alarm calls and 2 Magpies in one of the big Oaks and I saw big brown bird fly past the nest box. My suspicions were confirmed around 2 minutes later when a fine Tawny Owl flew out and south around 30 yards disappearing in the tangle of trees behind the marsh. A later look at Leathes Ham, revealed the Greenshank feeding on the edge of the island again and this time it was joined on the island by a Common Sandpiper.

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