Oare in the sunshine 10th March 2007

After all of the rains just lately, it was so pleasant to wake to a gloriously sunny day on Saturday. We gathered our gear together and headed of for Oare. At first it seemed a quiet morning until a loud squabbling filled the air. It was a pair of Little Egrets fighting over a much prized patch on the Marshland

We watched their antics for a while until one of them admitted defeat and flew off. The other Egret then settled down to preen. Meanwhile, a Grey Herron flew past looking to see what all the fuss and commotion was about.

A lovely female Kestrel also flew over and hovered overhead for a while, but all was now quiet so she flew off looking for something to catch for dinner.

The excitement over, I sat down for a quick rest, but Mick suggested that we walked over to the footpath behind us to see if we could see the Stonechat we photographed last time we were here.

Alas, we could hear the Stonechats but they were too shy today to come close. Instead we walked over to the small stream and said hello to a pair or Coots. Coots are normally very shy and run off long before you can get close, but today they were enjoying the sun and happily posed for us.

There seemed a lot of Gulls flying about today, so we walked towards the main River to try and photograph some of them. The Little Egret we saw earlier flew past us to show how nicely her feathers were after her meticulous preening

As we approached the River a series of loud shrieks assailed our ears. It was a trio of black headed Gulls doing their choir practice. Although the melody was not as pleasant as the songbirds they certainly sang it with some gusto

We walked back to the main roadway and now it was Mick’s turn to sit for a quick rest and a head rub whilst enjoying the sunshine

It was nearly time to go home, but just before we left we noticed this little Moorhen playing hide and seek in the long grass.

Back home, it was such a nice day that we spent a little while in the garden taking some macro shots. This shot is of a little Zebra jumping spider, it is only about 5mm long but is certainly a formidable hunter and moves very fast.

We hope that you enjoyed todays pictures. More pictures can be found in our Galleries at www.voinapics.co.uk


Steve & Mick