Tuesday 1 May 2012

Call Noah, the floods have arrived!

Floods in May, I am dreaming?! I arrive home from work, ignore the waiting wife and children and head straight out to the floods. After all, I've seen the family hundreds of times before, whereas I have never seen floods in May in Cuddesdon. And could the habitat look any better? There are loafing flocks of Lesser Black-backed Gulls at the edges, while Yellow Wagtails zip past overhead:


And almost immediately something very unusual :


A pair of Gadwall shoot past, only the second Cuddesdon record after a small flock on some winter floods over a year ago. Then this floated past:


A bastard hybrid of Canada Goose and Greylag Goose. And who said local patch birding was a whole load of effort for no reward? There was little else of note, a few Mute Swan, 6 Tufted Duck and some more Gulls, but the potential is enormous. Little Egret? Common Tern? Species an arable patchworker can usually only dream about.


Nobody could say I didn't get stuck into the floods today...

2 comments:

  1. I am deeply jealous. Our local flood has only produced black tern, garganey, 3 iceland gulls & up to 800 whimbrel. And 3 black-winged stilts. I dream of Cuddesdon in flood.

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  2. Hi James, try eating less cheese before you go to bed, all that dreaming of Cuddesdon in flood. It might also be the cause of those hallucinations of waders, ducks and gulls. How about moving inland, its far less stressful, there is barely a bird to identify...

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