I have ventured forth on a couple of occasions over the past few weeks. On 12th July, being my first trip out since my operation, I decided to go to Welney WT as a pair of Spoonbills had been reported.

Only once have I been lucky with this species - in 2008 at Grafham Water and any other encounters have been very distant. I was hoping for some nice close action shots but had to be satisfied with distant action shots. In any event, they usually spend most of the day asleep.

Arriving at the hide, no Spoonbills were apparent until a juvenile started to feed. After a while, an adult appeared from behind an island and from then on was pestered by the juvenile for food, despite it being able to feed on it's own.

Not much of significance after that.

Last Wednesday, 18th July, a friend and I were attracted to north Norfolk as a rarity, Lesser Yellowlegs, had been reported at Titchwell RSPB. This is an american wader that sometimes looses it's way on migration and instead of travelling south in the USA, migrates southwards in Europe. I have only ever seen one other of this species, at nearby Thornham in 2007. As soon as we arrived in the hide, it was feeding in front of us with the sun shining too.

We stayed for most of the morning with it performing on and off although it was getting more and more cloudy. I dislike photos of birds on grey water - most uninteresting - so it was a case of pick and choose.

The usual Ruff were feeding.

We moved on at  lunch but with nothing around the usual haunts, returned to Titchwell. I was now very overcast and not much else around of interest. We will see what the really hot weather brings this week but not expecting too much.