Birding

Three very different bird shots from two very different expeditions today. As the sun was shining, I went for a morning walk round Maxey, where I saw the first lesser celandines of the year flowering in the churchyard. I also spotted a group of four goosander on one of the older gravel pits nearby. I ended up by walking along the South Drain, where I finally caught up with the pair of stonechats that have been present for much of the winter, and enjoyed listening to a veritable chorus of skylarks in the adjacent arable field. This farmland bird has declined significantly in the UK, but is thankfully still common in the Peterborough area.

At two o'clock I was just sitting down to a Zoom meeting for eastern England BSBI recorders when I received a text from Chris telling me that he'd just found a great northern diver at Ferry Meadows - great excitement - the first ever recorded from the site. I would have loved to rush out there and then to see it, but had to wait until my meeting had finished before I could set off.

As I got in the car it started to rain, and by the time I'd headed to the west end of Gunwade Lake, where it was last seen, I was pretty wet and there was no sign of the diver, or any birders. I carried on round the lake and finally spotted it at the eastern end, just about visible in the gloom. My photographs came out better than I expected considering I wasn't wearing my glasses and couldn't really see what I was focusing on! But on the whole I liked the slow shutter speed shots of black-headed gulls taking off from the adjacent flood meadow better (see extra).

By the time I was close to the path back to the car it was nearly dark and I looked like a drowned rat. But I stopped for a little longer to watch the diver in the distance, and was taken aback when I heard its call drifting over the lake - such an eerie and haunting sound, and not one I ever expected to hear in Peterborough. It called twice more before I decided to head home. You can listen to a recording of it here.