Yorkshire Wildlife Trust Potteric Carr & Doncaster Lakeside

I thought I would just do one post for a couple of quick visits we had to two places in Doncaster.

Firstly YWT Potteric Carr reserve.A fantastic reserve and one of our favourites to visit on a day off.
A walk around the cold and frosty reserve on a Sunday morning.
Blue Tit at the feeding station.

 Blackbird searching for food underneath the leaf litter.

 The Mute Swans had taken over the only bit of unfrozen lake available.

 Ice on the logs.

 One of 4 grey squirrels at the feeding station at Willow Hide

 Great Tits fighting for the bird table.

 The star of the day, a Water Rail seen at Cottage Drain Hide.

 A flock of 8 bullfinches graced the tree tops.

 One of a pair of Little Egrets flying around the reserve.

 The kingfisher was in his usual place down on the Mother Drain.

 Quite a few Long Tailed Tits near to the visitor centre.

Doncaster Lakeside

Just a couple of minutes away from Potteric Carr is Doncaster Lakeside.Its a village outlet shopping park with the towns football ground but the highlight for me is obviously the large lake and wildlife on it.

It has mallards,tufted ducks,canada geese,mute swans,coots,little grebes,black headed gulls,great crested grebes,gadwall & cormorants.

Mallard coming in for landing

 Black-headed Gull

 Tufted Ducks

 In this one you can see the nictitating membrane closing to protect the eye as it dives.

 Canada Geese flying over.

 Mute Swan

 Little Grebe or Dabchick

 Great Crested Grebe

Thanks again for looking through my photos.:)

First trip to our local patch in 2014 - Messingham Sand Quarry

It was only 90 minutes at the reserve in Messingham, North Lincs. but it was enough time to see quite a few birds.
On arrival into the carpark I was greeted with the sight of 3 common buzzards circling the pine trees.
Not a great pic but this was the closest one of the 3.

The usual woodland birds were at the edge of the carpark enjoying seed put down by other visitors.
Coal Tit

Blackbird

1 of several robins chasing each other around the feeding area.

After spending time at Grebe Lake looking for an otter without success, a walk through the woods produced a flash of white down the tree trunk and the appearance of a treecreeper.

Onto the duck hide overlooking the main lake.There were several shelducks to the left of the hide.They always seem to favour this side maybe just keeping out of the way of the hundreds of greylags.

The greylags, about 200 this day were their usual entertaining selves with birds having baths, fighting and calling loudly when other groups of geese flew onto the lake.
Greylag Geese

Leaving the hide and heading back the other way through the pines I noticed a small bird flitting about the base of a tree in the brambles.My first Goldcrest of the year but I only managed to get this photo as it turned and flew further into the trees.

On leaving the reserve, at the gate this stunning male kestrel was on the phone cable surveying the hedgerows for food.

So not bad for a quick 90 minutes around the reserve.Total bird sightings were:

3 Coal Tits

6 Robins

2 Dunnocks

6 Blackbirds

2 Blue Tits

4 Chaffinches

3 Buzzards

1 Treecreeper

1 Goldcrest

200 Greylags

7 Shelducks

15 Cormorants

12 Mute swans

40+ Black Headed Gulls

1 Bullfinch

10 Coots

1 Kestrel

plus 2 Grey squirrels

Thanks for reading:)

2013 Photo Review

Well its the end of another year so I thought I would add 12 photos , 1 from each month that I liked and that summed up the highlights of the month.
Thanks to all that have looked at the photos and read through my blog that I began this year.Hopefully 2014 will see me reach new places with new wildlife to share.

January
Dunnock at SSSI Messingham Sand Quarry Reserve during our snowy week.

February
A visit to Twycross Zoo for Valentines Day and getting to watch the female Western Lowland Gorilla care for her newborn.

March
Watching Badgers on my birthday in the Speyside Wildlife Hide at Rothiemurchus near Aviemore during our trip up to the Scottish Highlands.

April
Seeing the gannets back at RSPB Bempton Cliffs in East Yorkshire

May
Getting closer to Great Skuas than I probably wanted to, on Handa Island off North West coast of Scotland

June
My first ever trip over to The Farne Isles to get up close to Puffins & Arctic Terns.

July
It was a good year for hawkmoths in our garden but finding my first ever Orange Moth at Chambers Farm Wood in Lincolnshire was a highlight.

August
This was the month of the Rutland BirdFair where I met some old online friends and new ones as well as heroes such as Jonathan Scott & Simon King.Unfortunately they are all beaten by the spectacle of watching Red Kites swooping around the Dumfries & Galloway countryside.

September
The first ever Spurn Migration Festival at YWT Spurn Point happened in this month.A brilliant new event that will get even better this year.Plenty of fellow birders, Red-Backed Shrikes and ending with this stunning Hummingbird Hawkmoth.

October
The Red Deer rut started and we got to watch it at our local country park Normanby Hall in North Lincolnshire.

November
The arrival of the grey seal rookery at Donna Nook on the Lincolnshire coast where we saw newborn pups feet away.

December
During a week of gales & tidal surges causing flooding in the local villages along the Humber & Trent a surprising sight of 1000's of knots and lapwings on the Humber sandbars near the Humber Bridge.

Thank you again to all who have read my blog and hopefully will continue too if I can get out to places and manage to get things to share with you all.
I look forward to seeing what everyone else gets to during 2014.
Take care.
A Happy New Year to all and I hope you all have a fantastic 2014.

Stuart

Grey Seal Spectacle on the Lincolnshire East Coast

Its been a while since I posted anything on here so thought I would finally get chance today.

From October to December, on the east coast of Lincolnshire there is a beach called Donna Nook where you can have an amazing wildlife experience viewing a grey seal colony rookery.Around 1500 seal pups were born here last year.

 It is nearly always very cold with the wind blowing in off the North Sea and the military training goes on with jets flying over the colony without a hint of disturbance to the seals below.

Last week we spent a couple oh hours here before the cold, mixed with my arthritis got the better of me.
The highlight of the trip had to be arriving just as a cow had given birth.This is what the new arrival looked like after 10 minutes from birth.

More of the white furry characters that were dotted all over the windswept beach.

There were stories happening all over the beach, between cows & bulls, cows & cows or cows and their pups like this one.

Awww, please play mum.

Mmmm, its chewy.

Oi, get off me.....slap.

Waaaaahhh!!

Oh, lay shut up and lat still and let me get some rest.

I love you really.

Cow fights occur when they get a bit too close to each others pups.

Suckling pup

 

Another fun event.

"Hey, Frank don't smile for the photographers"

"Eh, what did you say?"

"Aww Frank, too late, what did I just say?"

"Haha, Vera, what's ee like?"

Donna Nook is also a great place to do a spot of birdwatching.With flocks of lapwings, goldfinches, starlings, redshanks as well as shelducks, wagtails & various gulls(have even seen a Glaucous Gull here previously), there is always something to see amongst the grey seals.

 I really do recommend a trip to Donna Nook during the late months to see one of Britains best wildlife events.

There, finally a new post :) Thanks very much for reading and for taking the time to look through the many photos.