BIRD NEWS: 936

 

Our trip to Borde Hill Gardens presented a sight for pigeon-dove lovers. Alas, they are all statues....and cost £60 each.

Further around, we noticed a former bird statue had broken...

Our next trip was back to Wakehurst, Liz being determined to catch the best of their bluebells.

Firstly, we found three lots of geese by the pond - a family of Greylags, a Canada goose and an Egyptian goose family.

There were a lot of people around, so I had to try to dodge them whilst getting my pictures.

Alas, I couldn't avoid the odd arm or leg getting in the view.

At least I managed to capture the geese, too!

BIRD NEWS: 935

 

Our next trip was back to Wakehurst Place and then Borde Hill gardens on easter Saturday. We met up with some geese. They were wandering along among the grass and lady smock.

Beyond the Greylag, there was a family of Egyptian geese, also strolling along.

They seemed quite tame and did not worry about us, so I managed some good close-up shots.

The geese were wandering everywhere, it seemed.

Geese, geese, more geese....

Oh - THAT is not a goose....

That is a crow!

That brings us to the end of the selection of bird pictures taken at Wakehurst.

BIRD NEWS: 934

 

At the next hide we saw Canada geese and seagulls mostly.....and a bee or wasp!

There was also an oyster catcher, but it ducked as I took the shot. there were also plenty of returning sand martens, but I didn't catch any of them on the camera.

There were a pair of Greylag geese with a single child in the wildlife garden.

The Bewick swans, Mr and Mrs Silvertag were lazing in their enclosure.

They do not look like they are nesting - again. The first year they had young whilst not being expected to have any for a few years, but there have been no more since.

If you are wondering what became of the Trumpeter duo, as I have posted so many of the Bewicks but no Trumpeters, so were we!

As we left the Bewicks, not having spotted the AWOL duo in their usual site, their old site, or any other enclosure as yet, a member of staff informed us that one had died. The remaining Trumpeter was getting lonely and had been put into the former diving duck aviary enclosure now housing black backed radjah shelducks. That brings us to the end of that excursion.

BIRD NEWS: 933

 

We wandered around the WWT at Arundel, taking a few pictures as we strolled. There were plenty of geese to photograph.

Nenes, swan geese, and........

......PIGEONS!

Some very pretty pigeons....

Even Liz had to agree that they looked pretty.

Then we went into the hides to see what we could see.

Not much - just the odd mallard, moorhen, tufted, and shelduck...

BIRD NEWS: 932

 

The Egyptian geese family swam even closer to us, so I kept taking pictures of them.

In this one, it is clear that there are 5 youngsters and 2 parents.

There were also a few Canada geese, mallards, coots....

The above shot shows a second family of Egyptian geese as well as a mallard. That concludes the Midhurst section of our day out. Next, onto WWT Arundel.

Here we see the two new male pelicans, brought in specially for the resident duo of females. The two men are in front of the women in this shot.

They seem to be staying apart, yet getting along OK. It is possible they may start breeding from next year onward, so there is plenty of time to sort out which one wants which one!!

The two greyer ones are the gents.

BIRD NEWS: 931

 

My last camera outing of Wakehurst Place was of a pair of buzzards flying above us.

Which you might just make out.

And that concludes my early April excursion to Wakehurst Place eith Liz.

Our next trip took us to Midhurst, then WWT Arundel. Our first ornithological sighting was the waterfowl at the lakes in Midhurst's parkland.

Over the back towards the road bridge swam a family of Egyptian geese.

They decided to swim towards us.

Closer and closer, they came.

HERE are the 2025 birdwatch results

BIRD NEWS: 930

 

The pheasant appears to be in hiding from my camera!

Liz had put a few seeds on the top of fence posts anyway, as we had brought some with us because on our last few trips they hadn't put food out.

I tried to take a good shot of a nuthatch, but....

...was not very successful. I did mansge to get a picture of the robin below though.

There is a greylag goose on a nest one end, and a canada goose the other end also nesting.

Greylag.....

.....and Canada