So, after almost a week in UK, today I finally had time for birding. This was a very busy week of house-hunting, school visiting, university stuff etc. On Thursday I attended the meeting of the EuroBirdPortal project at BTO - looks like it's going to be very interesting. But I saw virtually no birds the whole week long.
This morning I met up early with Nick and Peter (from Finland - he participated in the EBP meetings too). We started off at Hickling Broad that was OK - not too many migrants around but some nice stuff: 5 young Little Gulls were pretty good, a Bittern flew past a couple of times, a pair of Cranes was being loud from the forest behind the reserve, a pair of Garganey seemed to be in the business, and a few more bits and bobs. Weather was not great but not too bad.
Little Gulls
Sharp-eyed Nick
Then we went to Winterton Dunes. Nick and I covered large distances, mainly talking about past and future rarities that the habitat looks perfect for, but in fact there was very little in the way of migrants. The weather felt promising with good southeasterlies and some bursts of rain to knock all those megas down, but nothing happened.
The sea was quite alright though. Highlights (at least for the season) were Fulmar, Kittiwake, and six Common Scoters. There were also one Harbour Porpoise and one Grey Seal. There was a steady movement of Gannets, tons of Little and Sandwich Terns, and some single shorebirds.
And that was that. Back to the airport and now I'm in Amsterdam, headed back home. Back to UK in mid August. Many thanks to all my good friends who hosted, helped, gave advice etc. See you all pretty soon.