Cold and windy not conducive to good photography especially when the bird is a quarter of a mile away! However better to have a record shot than none at all which was what happened on Tuesday evening when we dashed up for a Western Orphean Warbler in Hartlepool - the bird was so elusive that we really only saw it when the local asbo kids kicked the fence behind it and threw stones and flushed it. Still a lifer for Wayne and two British ticks for me in a week.
So to the last Estonian post - now here’s an ugly bird but look what it will turn into - the absolute number one bird of the trip!
Not often you get to see and hear a Corncrake, this was one of the highlights of the trip for me.
Commonly breeding in Estonia’s wet forests definitely another aahh factor.
Still a few Barnacle Geese present but several hundred seen moving on for the summer.
White Tailed Eagles seen daily but always a little distant.
Caspian Tern
Oystercatcher
Common Cranes definitely very common in Estonia!
Whooper Swan
Just one more Black Woodpecker
Not sure what this is - any suggestions welcome
nor this one
or this
Ha this is a Morel!
and pretty sure this is a Map Butterfly
and this is definitely a tatty Camberwell Beauty
back to not sure!
Plenty of Black Woodpeckers to be see in the forests of Estonia and this one was particularly tame feeding in a car park! We also had Grey Headed, White Backed, Three Toed and Great Spotted Woodpeckers but no Lesser Spots or Middle Spots
