Friday 29 March 2019

Days of contrasting fortunes

Friday 29th March 2019

A day of decision regarding the E U , or perhaps not. Birding also requires decisions.Yesterday was relatively easy: get up early, no shower, no breakfast early and head south to look for a White Stork ( a real one). I had a rough idea where I was going in the Granborough valley but was relieved to locate a small group of cars in the middle of nowhere. Had to be Birders and yes there was Lee Evans with Mobile stuck to his ear hurrying along obviously on a mission. Good man to follow, seems to know what he's doing, which is more than I did. I'll follow at a respectful distance. But wait, he's stopped, hes coming back. A brief word as other Birders arrive 'its in the next village',Sawbridge, apparently. The treasure hunt begins, just four cars,but all eager to track down our quarry. Eventually we stop to look at some trees quite close to the road and there it is, perched on top of the tallest tree giving excellent views and opportunities for photography.

White Stork, Sawbridge

By contrast today was  disappointing . A migrant search taking in a number of sites in North Warks. was completely fruitless.  A reliable sighting of a Ring Ouzel came to nothing even after a search of likely habitat and not a Wheatear in sight, anywhere.Tomorrow, there will be a 'good' bird tomorrow.

2 comments:

  1. Hi Bob!!

    John Elder here, science writer and journalist: 21 years at the Sunday Age newspaper in Melbourne, Australia: now writing books and working part-time at The New Daily news site.

    One of the books I'm working on includes stories from people - including academic bird researchers - who had a profound or uncanny or surprising experience with a bird or birds as a child or teenager.

    The stories are a mix of what was going on with the person in their lives and the encounter or relationship with the bird(s) and how those two things are entwined.

    It's a bit of a literary effort as well as an ornithological one - at the end of the book I'll detail who everybody is, their blogs or books and so on.

    I am wondering if you had such an experience and if we can talk about it.

    Cheers for now and thank you.

    John j.birdy.elder@gmail.com

    ReplyDelete