David, Roger and I set of
early today heading for Lidlington in Bedfordshire hoping for a male Lady
Amherst’s Pheasant, which is apparently the last of the population that has
existed for some years in the area.
David and I had seen them in the distant past, with my last sighting as
long ago as March 1987, but it would be a new bird for Roger.
We arrived in the village just
before 07:30 and we then walked the short distance to view a narrow ride at the
Millbrook Proving Ground. We had heard
Nuthatch and seen Jay on the walk up to the view point and there were another
four birders on site when we arrived.
The view is very restricted and we heard the pheasant calling on quite a
few occasions when it appeared to be lower down the slope. Roger and David moved to try and view the
lower area, whilst I stayed looking down the drive. There were now a few more birders present
when one of those in a prime position cried it’s there at the top of the
ride. I looked and had the briefest of
views as it disappeared in the vegetation again. It must have taken all three seconds to move
across the ride and it was just beyond the crest of the hill and could only be
partially seen and therefore the views were extremely brief. Our plan was to give this bird a couple of
hours and then go on to the Brecks but as it was a lifer for Roger we gave him
the opportunity of saying how much longer we should give it. He suggested that we should leave at 09:15,
which is what we did, but the bird hadn’t reappeared and we hadn’t heard call
again either. We had seen a female
Blackcap and heard a male and there was also a couple of Chiffchaffs singing,
one of which I saw.
On getting back to the car we
set off for Foxhole Covert but made the mistake of going up the A11, which is
now a duel carriage way and there is now no access to the road we wanted and we
had to go almost to Thetford before we could turn back to Brandon. After a quick discussion we decided to visit
Santon Downham as Lesser Spotted Woodpeckers had been seen there
regularly. Having parked, we then walked
downstream hoping for a site of the woodpeckers. We found two others birders who had seen the
birds drumming on the previous two days but there was no sign today. We did see a couple of Kingfishers, three
Grey Wagtails and a couple of Siskin but eventually went back to the car and
headed for Weeting Heath.
Having paid our entrance fee
we went to the west hide where we saw four Stone Curlews and four Buzzards but
we were unable to locate the reported Firecrest.
After some lunch we drove the
short distance to Lakenheath Fen seeing a Little Egret on route. When we arrived we went to the wash land
viewpoint to scan the large flash. There
was a Great White Egret, seven Little Egrets and a Redshank on the flash and a
good variety of wildfowl, which didn’t unfortunately include the hoped for
Garganey. We walked along the public
footpath alongside the Little Ouse River but saw very little, although we did
hear a Cetti’s Warbler and a Chiffchaff.
There was another Cetti’s Warbler singing as we approached the Joist Fen
viewpoint and on reaching the viewpoint we settled down to scan the
reedbed. There were at least six Marsh
Harriers, including two males over the reedbed and a Crane was observed flying
low across the reeds before it dropped out of sight. A Bittern was heard booming on several
occasions and another Cetti’s Warbler was heard.
Kestrel
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