Early morning recce.... and an evening bonus!

Despite the fact we have not had any 'summer' this year there was a distinctive feeling of late summer on Pagham spit this morning. A Willow warbler was feeding up on the gorse and a few small tit flocks were on the move. Curlews were flying in off the sea and several Greenshanks were calling.

There were 10 Great Crested Grebes on the Lagoon and just 8 Little Terns on the Church Norton spit; unfortunately they seem to have all given up breeding. Bad news too for the Oystercatchers nest near the hide...eggs gone and no sign of parents .

A few pics from this morning...

Linnet

Whitethroat

The Childing Pinks are now showing well. As it happened one of the quiz questions (see below) revolved around rare species about which Pagham Harbour is renowned (and this was taken  in our beach garden today! )











The Friends of Pagham Harbour met at the Salthouse at 6.00pm this evening and enjoyed a quiz, an interesting talk and some excellent refreshments. The sun shone and it was a superb summers evening.

...and as an extra bonus a Glossy Ibis cirled above us, flying out high over the harbour and then returning and suddenly spiralling down into the reedbed just SE of Breech Pool. (sorry only a compact camera with me! )






....and just for the record this Arctic  Skua was harrassing the terns a couple of days ago just in front of our living room!