Resident cranes flying to feed at WWT Slimbridge

Having read reports of sightings of an unusual bird at WWT Slimbridge, I decided to go to try and see the Great Skua for myself. I also reasoned that the clear skies and lack of wind would make such a visit much more pleasant than on most winter days. Helena had suggested a visit this week anyway, having talked about the organised floodlit feeding of thousands of birds at dusk at Slimbridge. We are planning to go next Friday.

I decided to walk to the Holden Tower which has fine wide views of the tidal River Severn estuary where the Great Skua would be most at home and had been seen in the last few days. they tend to hunt smaller birds but also often chase other birds which have already caught their food and force them to drop it. They are big.

On the footpath to the tower I passed a couple of smaller hides at ground level. Virtually the first activity I saw in the sky was these five resident cranes flying south across the inner meadows and ponds, heading to the pastures next to the river, which often flood at high tides. I later saw them grazing close to the river banks with four other cranes, and they all wandered about the grassland quite rapidly with intermittent short flights, probably to save walking on their thin legs.

I didn't see a Skua, nor the Peregrine Falcons which often hunt from perches on fenceposts close to the river bank. But there were hundreds of geese grazing, swans flying in small groups and countless crows. I walked back to the smaller hide I'd visited earlier and watched huge numbers of varied water fowl, from teal, shelduck, pintail ducks and even a delightful water rail in a quiet spot near some reeds.

[My writing of this account has just been disturbed by a small bird, possibly a bullfinch, crashing into the large patio doors. It has flown off safely and I hope it hasn't been badly hurt  :-((  I have seen seven male bullfinches feeding at once outside  where I'm now sitting. We are so lucky.]

I also saw and tried to record the spectacle of massive flocks of Golden Plovers which flew in from high up and landed on the grass a few hundred yards away. There must have been thousands of birds. 

Then a single lapwing approached where I was standing in the hide and stayed close by for a long time, letting me watch it preening. I had no idea it had such a variety of beautiful coloured feathers.