It was another early start today; Meg was much better this morning thankfully, hopefully the prescription I got for her from the veterinary practise yesterday afternoon is beginning to take effect on her. The outside air temperature at 5.30am when we set of for our morning walk was 16C, it was quite humid on the Barff and very warm, I was quite grateful for the shade the trees provided from the early morning sunlight. We had a nice quiet walk though returning to the car for about 7.30am.

I planned to go to Fairburn again this morning but held back going so early, my reasoning being that on previous visits the Spoonbill adults have been returning to the nest with food between 11.00am and 11.30am. So  today I managed to get myself to the viewing area for 10.30am, the sun was shining, a lovely blue sky, it was going to be another scorcher, the temperature at 10.30am had risen to 22C, unfortunately as I was walking up to the site I watched the adult bird flying across the fields heading back to the nest which left me no time to unpack the camera gear, set up and take the photograph, consequently I spent the next three hours standing in the shade, watching the chicks and parent sleep for the rest of the day! So much for my ‘well thought out plan’.

Fortunately the Little Egrets were putting on quite a show and the Grey Herons were quite active too feeding their own chicks so I spent the remainder of the morning photographing the Egrets and Herons.

The return walk across the fields back to the visitors centre is always quite fascinating with lots of fritillaries and damsel flies flying around at knee height, the grass meadowland is now quite heavily parched after three weeks of constant sunshine and the path well worn, the wild flowers are in full bloom at the moment and providing a ready source of nectar and nourishment for them.

After a quick coffee in the visitors centre I walked across the car park to the feeding platform on the main lake, the water level has dropped significantly leaving vast expanses of mudflats, although there were only a few mute swans and mallards hoping for a snack, it was nice to see the Avocet chicks are still doing very well, the chicks were contently huddled together in a small group sleeping in the warm morning sunshine, their parents not very far away and making their presence known when any sign of danger appears.

A lovely morning at the reserve, I will have to wait till next week to see if the Spoonbills are a little more active, they shouldn’t be too far away from fledging now.