North Cave & Blacktoft Trip Report – 18/11/21

At the end of the day, 13 members said that they’d enjoyed the trip which surprised the leader a bit considering how quiet Blacktoft had been. We started at North Cave in glorious sunshine and between us, visited all the hides during the morning. The best viewing however, was from the covered picnic area opposite the butty van. Here, amongst the numerous lapwing we had excellent views of Common Snipe, Ruff, a Black-tailed

Ruff

Godwit and Redshank. Subsequently on our walk round, in addition to more common birds, we got a great view of a female Yellow Hammer. At lunchtime, rather sadly because we probably hadn’t spent enough time at North Cave, we headed off for Blacktoft. The early arrivals there were treated to a close view of a single Fieldfare looking magnificent in the sunshine. However, we were all keen to see the anticipated star of the show, the White-tailed Lapwing so an enquiry to a ‘bazooka’ toting photographer elicited that it was showing from Xerox Hide. Indeed it was and a very elegant bird in its subdued colours

White-tailed Lapwing – very rare migrant – breeds Central Asia as far west as Iraq

(except for the yellow legs). One member remarked that it had a rather kind face. However, that was the only bird on this lagoon, definitely a case of ‘Billy no mates’. And that pretty much summed up Blacktoft – no birds. Slight exaggeration but the Ousefleet Hide was the only one where a substantial number of birds were found and then not much variety. Towards the end of the afternoon, we arrived at the Singleton Hide hoping for a Marsh Harrier bonanza but here, while getting quite close views, there were only three

Marsh Harrier

birds in the air at any one time – a far cry from the eleven seen some years ago.
43 species in total not including a male Brimstone Butterfly at North Cave.

Photos thanks to Joyce Sawford and Martin Kaye