Out birding in the sunshine.

As soon as I saw that Friday was probably going to be the best day weatherwise of the weekend I thought I'd better grab the camera and get out there so off I headed to Brandon Marsh in bright sunshine.

Got there at 9.30AM and as I met up with a couple of friends in the car park Brandon was covered in a pretty thick mist.Hoping that the mist would soon lift we decided we would take the path past the sheep field to see if we could find anything but it wasn't till we got near to the Wright hide that we found anything to point our cameras at and that of all things was a Dunnock.Oh Dear!!!!!

The mist then started to lift and for late October it became a lovely day but finding any decent birds didn't improve and we found nothing at all from any of the hides on the main path.Two of us soon got fed up seeing nothing in the Carlton Hide so we headed back to the Baldwin hide where someone had seen the New Zealand Scaup earlier in the day.

As we entered the hide we were a little dismayed to find it occupied by a couple of families and when one of the fathers said to his daughter "Pass the bird book Jenny I think I can see a Whooper Swan" my mate and I whispered "Amateurs".However when I scanned the lake I was amazed to see a lone Whooper Swan not that far away and I was forced to eat humble pie and say to him "Well spotted".I was very pleased to see it because I haven't got any decent shots of a Whooper Swan and I missed out not long ago at Draycote Water when some flew off before I could get near them.

A Mute Swan soon chased off the Whooper towards Willow Island where it then went to sleep probably completely knackered having just flown in from Iceland.I then had a go at finding the NZ Scaup which for me is not easy as it looks a lot like a female Tufted Duck.I found it eventually and got a few shots.Although it hangs around with the Tufties it doesn't like them much and constantly has a go at them.

The only other decent birds I came across were a couple of Nuthatches but they were on the Cafe feeders so the only shots you can get is through the windows which ruins your shots.Now I know this shot is no good but it shows how good a shot you could get if you could get near the feeders in the open.