Yesterday was awful. Wet, windy, yuk. I'd mentally prepared myself for a day in the office catching up with some paperwork, cd player on in the background, kettle on. Nice. And then the phone rang & it was our cattle grazier who wanted to come up to take the calves off for weaning. Did he know what the weather was like up here? Yes, but it was the only date he could get up here in the forseeable. Ho hum. So into the waterproofs & out on the quad to get the cows and calves into the pens. At least the rain went off after a bit.
Today was slightly better - still pretty windy at first, but largely dry. The daily round of livestock & electric fence checking produced the spoonbill again on the Flood, still a couple of snow buntings along the seawall east of Swale hide (although mobile in the high winds this morning), single merlin & peregrine, bearded tits calling from the reeds and a small wader roost of 250 dunlin, 12 grey plover, 7 black-tailed godwit and a single avocet at Wellmarsh hide on the high tide.