BIRD NEWS:567

Next, a moorhen swam into view of my camera. The water was making gentle ripples quite an effective background for my pictures.

Along comes another coot. In fact, coot and moorhen were the 2 most populous bird on the canal that day. This male mallard had an almost green beak, rather than yellow as most males do at this time of year. Maybe it's a youngster, sick, or mis-bred - otherwise a late starter to change into spring plumage, perhaps.

There was a coot peeping out at me as I turned to walk back into Chichester city. This one seemed to have started builiding its nest - an early bird!

As I came back into town, a pigeon looked down at me from a treetop - while a row of seagulls clattered about nearby housing. The cormorants had moved towards town and were on a wooden buoy in the basin when I got back.