Our morning walk around the patch

The Westies, Kyfer in Background, & Misty in the foreground.

Most mornings I take the Westies up to the flood at Gilwilly-Thacka and they have a good walk round while I do my birding, so thought I would post a couple of pics of them seeing how they are mentioned in the website title.

Don't move that's really comfy.

There hasn't been a great deal of activity of late, at the back end of last week the 2 Mute Swans relocated to the new flood scheme and were joined by another pair, but didn't stay that long. As usual the Lapwings have been coming and going, some days like this morning there wasn't a one. Yesterday the flood was covered with gulls, a mix of Black-headed and Common. they had moved on to the flood from the new flood area as the diggers were working close to the water, I got the impression they had been to the Flusco landfill for breakfast as they were all having a good bath.
The one constant at the flood of late has been the Snipe, usually anything up to a dozen or more, they are usually on the extreme left of the flood as you look North-West.

The flood this morning looking very icy, pic below is to the left of this one

Usually hard to detect with bins (for me anyway)
but believe me there are getting on for 12 in this pic.
they are always on the uneven ground on the edge of the water.
Yesterday I also had a walk down to the settling pond, and after a while managed to find the male Mandarin, its been with us for about 3 weeks now, it will be interesting to see how long it stays.