Minsmere and Covehithe

On Sunday 26th January, freshly arrived back from the Holland trip, I was straight out to look for velver scoters of the Beach rd at Hopton, all I could see was a flock of 40 Common Scoter sat on the sea that eventually flew south, I also saw Andrew E and James B who had not seen the Velvets either. As soon as the message for Bewick's at Minsmereappeared on the BINS Whats App, I drove down to a blowy Minsmere where as I entered the Hide, I was pleased to see John G. To the right of the hide, on an island were 4 Whooper Swans mostly asleep, my targets the 4 Bewick's Swans were on the left hand side of the Scrape mostly feeding in the water. There were around 8 Dunlin and initially I couldn't see the Purple Sand. John then said he had the Purple Sand and the excellent Purple Sandpiper feeding on a bund just behind some Dunlin, it flew to a few rocky islands and was frequently feeding and flying from island to island, a real Brucie bonus as I have not seen this wader species on Minsmere Scrape before. On island closer to the East Scrape hide were a lot of sleeping Pintail c18, all male, a pair of Teal fed very close to the hide and a female Marsh Harrier quartered the reeds at the back. John picked out 3 Caspian Gulls (an adult, 1st winter and 2nd winter) and a 2nd winter Yellow- legged Gull in the Gull flock at the back. A Whats App message from brian S had me calling in at Covehithe, it was in the eye of the Storm Figaro and as I walked to Covehithe Broad I was initially sand blasted until I walked the other side of the sand dunes, no sign of the Scaup at the north end, but as I checked the south end, bang in the middle of the south section of the Broad were the 2 excellent female Scaup, at last after 5 attempts I have seen them for this year. I beat a hasty retreat as the storm was worsening and it was raining.