Rye Harbour Thursday 22nd July

Carol and I drove down to Rye today. We've planned this a few times lately and each time we did something happened to stop us, sea fog on a couple of occasions I recall. We drove through a bit of rain on the way down but by the time we reached Rye Harbour and the nature reserve the sun was back out and with a nice sea breeze it couldn't have been better.
The first thing of note was a sighting of a Wheatear on the shingle, I wasn't expecting that. This would be one of the small number of birds that arrive in the spring on migration and stay here to breed through the summer.

As we reached the end of the first part of the track and turned right to walk westwards, parallel to the beach, the air was full of the shrill calls of Little Terns flying to and fro the sea carrying small fish for their young. They are nesting in a protected area and the reserve management 'planted' plastic decoy birds to ancourage them to breed there instead of on the open beach where they would be more susceptible to predation. What a great idea.

Also along this stretch we saw Sandwich and Common Terns which nest on the islands on the lakes. The only one I managed to get a half decent picture of was the Common variety below. The little Terns were too fast and the Sandwich were mostly too high.

COMMON TERN

Of course there were plenty of other species seen during our walk of approximately six miles including Lapwings, Little Grebe, Kestrel, singles of Dunlin and Redshank and Skylarks whose superb and endless refrain filled the air and accompanied us mostly unseen for the majority of the walk. Carol commented that it seemed as if the sky was singing, couldn't have put it better myself.

But for all this the star of the show, pictured below lots of times, were the Ringed Plover family.

THIS IS MUM

She was sitting on two eggs when we arrived. But she got off the nest briefly to reveal that she had now got another chick and just one egg to go.

THE LATEST ARRIVAL

THIS IS JUNIOR

He was looking after the other two chicks.

Without his legs he was about the size of a ping pong ball. He was happily wandering around pecking at tiny morsels, independent even at this age. But he soon got tired and made his way back to Mum.

MOVE UP I'M COMING IN

While he was tucking himself up under Mum we managed to get another glimpse of the remaining egg.

EGG AND LEG

He didn't stay under for too long before curiosity got the better of him and he popped back out, maybe he just went under to say hello to his new brother or sister.

BETWEEN A ROCK AND A SOFT PLACE

It was soon change over time on the nest and Dad got his first look at chick number three.........

HELLO SON I'M YOUR DAD

..........While Mum went off for a wash and brush up.

THE PROUD PARENTS

Hirundines seen today were Sand and House Martins. A family of Shelducks, a Grey Heron and a Little Egret also made the diary as did a single Little Ringed Plover which frequented the edge of a nearly dried up scrape.

The best butterfly of the day was a single Painted Lady which I felt was worthy of inclusion as i've only seen one other this year.

PAINTED LADY

AND AGAIN

AND AGAIN

And finally..........................we saw a humble old Linnet on the way back. Humble? I don't think so what an absolute cracker!!

LINNET