Call of the Wild

There are some wildlife sounds that instantly evoke the atmosphere of whole landscapes. For me it’s the sound of redshanks, which you can find at this web site. For me their calls summon up a host of memories of visits to desolate saltmarshes, windswept sandy beaches and surf on rocky shores. Anybody else got any iconic wildlife sounds that convey the same sense of place?

These redshanks were on the beach at Seaburn last weekend.

Cold Enough to Freeze the Toes off a Turnstone

This turnstone that had lost all its toes on both feet was running around on the beach at Seaburn last weekend. It had no toes on either foot, which leads me to wonder whether it had hatched like that and that the defect might be a genetically-controlled developmental abnormality, rather than the result of an accident. It didn't seem to inhibit the bird's movement at all, although moving around on slippery rocks to flip stones over might have been a challenge. Check out the distinctive footprints.........

Snow buntings at Sunderland

We had heavy snow showers on the coast on Friday, so today the snow was still covering the upper part of the beach at Seaburn, where we found this flock of about a dozen snow buntings in about as natural a setting - for a snow bunting - as you could wish for. By early afternoon we had a very high spring tide that pushed the birds into the narrow zone between the edge of the snow and the beach, where they fed on the tideline where snow-covered grass met the stranded seaweed, flotsam and jetsam.

 

I Must Go Down to the Sea Again....

Christmas day's trip to the coast turned out to be so enjoyable that we decided to do it all over again on Boxing Day - but this time to Seaburn, just north of Sunderland. The rainbow turned out to be a good omen. At the north end of the beach we found this...

..bar-tailed godwit following the waves in and out with a flock of sanderling...

...probling the sand along the tideline before..

...flying off to ....

... perch on a rock for a preen..and then ....

... pause again for a moment's reflection. Smaller waders included...

...sanderling...

...dunlin...

...knot...and plenty of ....

... ringed plover, with those fake tan orange legs.