Ringed Plover

The weather forecast was horrible today for pretty much all my usual places, but I was restless and wanted to be out and about, so I decided to take a chance on Farmoor. It worked out pretty well, though by the time there was rain visibly approaching from one side of the reservoir, and thunder rumbling on both sides, I began to think I'd pushed my luck as far as was sensible. At that point I retired to the café, emerging after my coffee and cake and heading for the car park just as it began to rain in earnest.

Bird of the day was this Ringed Plover, a small, short-billed wader that was darting back and forth along the water's edge, looking for food. Unlike longer-billed waders, which use their sensitive bill tips to probe for food, Ringed Plovers hunt by sight. This is most likely an incoming migrant bird because while we have around 5,500 breeding pairs of Ringed Plovers in the UK, the winter population swells to over 40,000 individuals due to northern European birds moving south. Alternatively it might be a passage migrant, because Great Britain is also on the flight path for Ringed Plovers from Canada and Greenland, which make phenomenal south-eastward transatlantic journeys in order to winter in West Africa. The incomplete dark collar and the slightly scaly appearance of the feathers on its head and back identify this as a first winter bird; if it's lucky in its life choices, it could live another ten or fifteen years.

My second photo shows a pair of Egyptian Geese, which might have made it to top spot if I'd caught them before they began to turn away from me, because I don't believe I've ever posted one before. This is an introduced species, native to the Nile Valley and sub-Saharan Africa, which was originally brought to the UK by collectors. Over the past few decades large numbers have escaped from captivity and formed self-sustaining breeding colonies. They're more closely related to Shelducks than to geese, and are about the same size, and their brown eye patches, turquoise specular patches and pink legs are especially striking. They always look to me like soft toys that have been put together from odds and ends of fabric, and then put through the washing machine a few too many times. 

R: C5, D2.