Cattle Egret
Beautiful weather, along with a good variety (and number!) of birds has made the past couple of days a joy to experience!
Lots of Whooper Swans here, with numbers slowly increasing to the point where there are currently about 600 birds on the Mere. Lots of other wildfowl, particularly teal, but good numbers of Wigeon, Pintail, and Mallard in particular with smaller numbers of Shoveller and Pochard.
A Cattle Egret spent about half an hour on one of the islands in the Mere before disappearing un-noticed, possibly just out of sight in one of the ditches. This is the first sighting this year at the Mere of what is still a very rare bird in spite of the increasing numbers of records from around the UK. This was probably one of the four which have been on this side of the Ribble Estuary this year.
Also on the reserve today, Marsh Harrier, Peregrine, at least 40 Ruff, 3 Black-tailed Godwits, and 60+ Snipe.
Don't forget to pop into this In Focus shop for the latest on what has been seen and to pass on your own sightings to help others get thwe most out of their visit.
