Weekend in Suffolk Day 1

Last Friday Me and Andy along with Mike Williams went on the York Bird Club Weekend trip to Suffolk. Plan A was travel down via Herefordshire but as a certain Cream Coloured Courser decided to depart early we had to revert to Plan B, the Brecks, we visited a new reserve for all of us first, Lackford Lakes, a Turtle Dove and a couple of Nightingales were singing near the car park when we arrived, we spent some time with the latter as the main reason for visiting the reserve is the number of pictures of this species photographed here, alas there were none posing that morning maybe earlier in the day/season would be better, we may have had some brief views of them flitting through the bushes but that was it. We then took a walk around the rest of the reserve, there were several Egyptian Geese as to be expected and Marsh Harriers and half a dozen Hobbies performed overhead but it was generally fairly quiet, the main highlight being a Muntjac wandering about quite oblivious to our presence. After lunch we headed to nearby Cavenham Heath, a site given to us as an alternative to Weeting for Stone Curlew, it was a superb bit of Heathland but the Stone Curlew still took a bit of finding although when we did pick one out we got pretty good views although still too far for photography, also Green Woodpecker showing well and Wood Lark singing. We finished off at Lakenheath where we took a stroll out to the far wood where a Golden Oriole was singing away and after a bit of a stake out Andy managed to pick it out on the edge of the wood and got the scope on it so we all got a rare sighting of this superb songster. We returned along the river bank and several Hobbies put on a good show and a scan over a piece of marshland found two Common Cranes feeding their two youngsters although the vegetation was so high you could only see their heads then with time getting on we hightailed it over to the Crown in Westleton where we were staying and joined the rest of the group for dinner.

Egyptian Geese at Lackford Lakes

A couple of Lackford Lakes scenics

a good few Hobbies hunted overhead

confiding Muntjac

distant Stone Curlew in the heat haze at Cavenham Heath

injured Whooper Swan at Lakenheath

a couple of Hobbies put on a good show

you can just see the head of one of the youngsters on the right hand side of this picture