Grunt and Groan!

The plan was to spend the afternoon at Old Moor finishing off with the Bittern prior to starting my standby shift. That was, until work rang to ask if I could go in early. Now I'd like to think of myself as someone who's always happy to help out at work in times of need but I must admit I was a little bit perturbed when I found out that it was to get my tracker repaired. Not as it took them long to sort it mind you, as the engineer was quick to explain that the double wrap of lead flashing I'd put round it to keep the frost off was also blocking the signal! Oh well, if anyone knows of a good reason to explain a vans attraction to water please let me know ASAP. That's the groan over with. The grunt came from the Bittern that showed up after I'd left. Apparently it climbed up the reeds and grunted four times. Fascinating. And I'm reliably informed that this makes it a male as apparently females don't grunt. Do not even go there!

A group of Shovelers at Wath Ings. Beautiful day, shame I had to depart early!

The rest of the news as follows: Skeins of c150 and c70 Pink-feet passed over. 63 Goosanders and 4 Goldeneye roosted tonight. 6 Brambling (2 males) were around the car park/Tree Sparrow Farm. A Woodcock was flushed by the work party on Gypsy Marsh who were also treated to a visit by 60 Waxwings. 50 Waxwings were also seen on Warbler Way. And finally, a Little Owl was by the Goldthorpe Roundabout at the eastern end of the Goldie Fields.