I have had a bit of a disruptive week so far, one of the dogs has been poorly with an upset tummy since Tuesday morning. I have been getting up in the early hours (1.30am ish) of yesterday and again this morning to quite a mess on the kitchen floor. Typical Chocolate Labrador! Her sister went through a bout of bad tummies about a year ago and I thought they had both grown out of it. I am pretty certain it is nothing to serious as she has been eating her meals as usual and no problems whilst training and exercise etc, I took her to the vets this afternoon as a safety precaution and hopefully after a course of ‘liquid cement’ she should start to improve. As I write this note late this evening, she seems quite perky and mischievous so I’ll see what sort of a night I have with her.

After breakfast and with Meg & Gracie settled down after their morning regime I headed back over to the reserve at Fairburn Ings to see if the Spoonbills would be a little more active than my last visit on Monday. I arrived at the nest site around 9.15am with just one parent bird on the nest, it flew off as I was setting up my camera equipment and that was the last I saw of it. The chicks were still quite active with the biggest bird doing a lot of wing flapping on the edge of the nest, I can imagine the other three chicks being a bit peeved as they look a little smaller than the eldest bird and every now and then they would get wacked by an uncontrolled wing or a foot as the eldest bird lost its balance before falling back into the nest whilst practising its pre flying routine. Other than the wing flapping there was no other activity on the nest which was a little disappointing.

Fortunately the neighbouring Little Egrets were quite active with three of them practising aerial jousting at one stage, later in the morning a pair of them tried to knock each other off the branch they were standing on with a flick of the wing and a peck of the long beak, both quite effective methods of moving your mate.

Several Grey Herons were flying into their own nest sites with food for their young, they, the chicks are quite vocal when they know food is on its way. 

By mid-morning the sun was scorching hot, 27C, I was pleased I could get some shelter in the shade of the Hawthorne hedge, as the time marched on and with no imminent signs of activity I called it a day an headed back to the visitors centre and home.