I had a brief but satisfying visit to Spurn this weekend.
Arriving in the dark the thing that struck me was how mild it was.
The morning dawned clear and I was up and out well before dawn. I wanted to try a spot on the Humber which I knew would be a fair walk. At 630 there was enough light to see where I was going and by 650 I was at my preferred location.
The first birds I saw was a good flock of lapwing darting out over the Humber and flying low over the water. It was a bit dark to get a shot but some of the photos captured the scene nicely.
Waders started moving as it got light mainly curlew and the odd redshank.
A merlin perched briefly on a dead branch washed up by recent big tides, but flew off over the bank before I could get a shot.
A sparrowhawk shot through and a pair of marsh harriers began harassing the waders and wildfowl in the distance.
After a while the sun had fully risen and the colour had gone out of the sky. Just as I was packing away a woodcock flew round in a circular loop and I just managed to get a few shots off.
A kestrel was perched briefly near the pumping station and a mixed flock of finches and buntings were flitting around the bank-top hawthorns.
I went back to the van for some late breakfast and then was back out this time at Kilnsea Wetlands.
The first birds I saw as I got out of the car was a couple of stonechat, after a while they were joined by a third bird.
I spent the afternoon on the top of the bank between Kilnsea Wetlands and Beacon Ponds.
There was a nice drake pintail, albeit quite distant as well as other common wildfowl mainly wigeon, shoveler and teal.
A flock of twite bounced past and then a short eared owl appeared. It flew past me and then doubled back about half an hour later.
The sunset was nice and provided some nice photo opportunities of roe deer, waders and one of the stonechats on the look out for flies in the very last moments of sunlight.
As we move towards winter, the likelihood of migrant birds especially rare or scarce ones diminish, however the opportunities to carry on photographing wildlife at Spurn and on the Humber still abound.
