'First of the Month' -on the 2nd

Tuesday June 2
I forgot the date and arranged to meet a friend for lunch yesterday, hence the day late outing. Starting out at 4.55 on a lovely sunny morning with a cool northerly wind, first stop was Sculthorpe Moor NR. We are usually fairly successful, peering over the locked gate at the feeders, but not to-day. With a little encouragement, the Spot Fly showed well in a nearby car park but we had to search the Harpley area for a Tree Sparrow. Breakfast at Abbey Farm, enjoying the sight of a single adult Kingfisher followed by one weakly flying, newly fledged, young.
After a false start, we found the new beet-field site for the Black-winged Pratincole, we'd never known that there is a reservoir there. From the field entrance we watched it sitting on a ploughed area, often next to an Oystercatcher, for at least half an hour. It made one short flight but spent much of the time preening. We moved to the other side of the field, hoping for a closer view, where we found Bob and a friend of his. The BWP flew off west, we told Bob where to look for it and drove to Holme NOA car park for a welcome coffee.
Returning to the cereal field site, we were just in time to see the BWP fly overhead and back to the east. No photos to-day then....
Just as far as the freshwater pool at Titchwell, seeing well the female RC Pochard and her 8 young. Delightful. We enjoyed helping a few novice birder couples identify the few birds around, the highlight for us was our first Norfolk Common Sandpiper of the year. So many ducklings and goslings everywhere including this attractive Barnacle Goose family in Holkham Park.


Stopping at Salthouse for our customary ice-cream, Pam used my Canon + 100-400 lens to take this picture of a Coot and it's punk young.

Bob's friend (must find out his name) had told us of a Happisburgh site for Turtle Dove - which we still haven't seen. Nor did we this time... but a Little Owl glided from an oak tree, onto the verge, as we drove by.
A long day but a leisurely one, we were pleased to have seen 91 species.