Dipper de do da.

It was one of those days, I started the day off by taking the Westies for their usual early morning walk. And its usually on this walk I start to formulate my plans for the day, because as I'm on my wonder I can take stock of the weather, and what it might do during the course of the day. Well I have to say it wasn't giving a great deal away this morning, it was alternating between sun, with dirty big black clouds circling and the odd spot of rain. Back home I thought I'll give it a while, and catch up on e-mail, and a few other jobs. By 10am  the sun was cracking, so not wanting to wast it I grabbed the camera jumped in the car and set off.
    I decided to have a ride up to  Wetsleddale  where there is a dam surrounded by high moorland, and is partly owned by the RSPB.  To reach it you can either use the M6 to Shap Which is the nearest village, or use the A6, in which case if you are driving from the North , you would drive through Shap. I decided on the A6, and hadn't been on this road long when the sun disappeared, never to be seen again for the rest of the day, daaaam.
    Long before you get to the dam there is a beck, which I always stop at just in case there are any Grey Wagtails about, as I have found them here before. As I approached the beck two birds lifted and flew down stream, too big to be Wagtails, they landed again about 30 yards away.

I was delighted to see a pair of Dippers (Cinclus cinclus) doing their usual bobbing movement.

I was cursing the lighting, not only was it dull and trying to rain, but I was looking down on them, into a little gorge.

Then there was one, they move like lightening, and one disappeared while I was altering the camera settings.

They are so well camouflaged, if it wasn't for the white chest they could easily be overlooked.

 If I approach them directly they would be off, stealth was needed, so I backed off out of sight, did a little circular, and made my approach from a different direction, this involved sliding around on my backside, and getting it soaking wet, as the area was covered with sedge and Sphagnum moss and dripping with cold water.

If only the sun had been shining, its the first time I've seen a Dipper standing on one leg, unless its only got one leg.

By now its mate had disappeared back up stream, and this one soon followed, I thanked them for allowing me into their world for a little while.

Up at the Dam I was surprised to find a large raft of Wigeon, (this is only part of the raft) with a few Mallard mixed in, and all the time the bubbling/rippling call of the Curlew could be heard coming from the surrounding moorland. I also found quite a bit of frogspawn, unfortunately it had been laid in flooded tractor tracks, so will not survive, the next tractor along, and it will be doomed

Linking to Stewarts Wild bird Wednesdayhttp://paying-ready-attention-gallery.blogspot.co.uk/