As soon as Brian and I opened the car doors we could hear the chiffchaff calling loudly from the overgrown garden of the old demolished farmhose. I quickly picked up skylarks singing as well, so a real spring morning. There was a lot of activity on the pit where once we used to come fishing. This was mainly a large number of black-headed gulls but there were geese (greylag and canada), a few oystercatchers, cormorant, tufted duck and coot. Once sorted out we set off down the track at the back of the mitigation land picking up curlew, wigeon, shelduck, shoveler and lapwing as we went. Arriving at Skitter Beck another chiffchaff sang loudly from the trees. It was time for lunch so we hunkered down where we were sheltered from the chill northerly breeze. During lunch we spotted the first of two swallows heading north.
Lunch over we checked out the moth of the beck and were pleased to see half a dozen avocet. These iconic birds were feeding noisily, sweeping their distinctive up-turned bills through the liquid mud sieving out tiny organisms to eat. Wandering back along the sea wall we found a group of dunlin and more shelduck. As we arrived back at the pit our ears were assailed by the loud, explosive call of a cetti's warbler, a first for me at this site.
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