Birding the coast of Norfolk

There are some great birding spots all along the north coast of Norfolk.  In this post, I'll show two of them. The first is at Thornham.  We stopped here to look for waders (shorebirds) and also Twite are often found here.  This small bird sometimes winters in Norfolk and then goes back up north to breed on moorland or coastal heaths.  It's not a bird I get too see very often at all and we didn't manage to find any on this occasion. Shame!  Here are my birding friends getting booted up for our mucky walk. I'd made the mistake of washing my car just before this trip. I shouldn't have bothered! (-:

This area in the photo below can be great for waders at the right tide time.

We saw a few waders like Curlew, Black-tailed Godwit, Dunlin, Knot, Redshank and Oystercatcher, but most of them were way too distant for the camera.  Here is a lone Oystercatcher that was reasonably close with a 1st winter Black-headed Gull behind.

The only other wader near enough for a shot was this Redshank.

The second place is Warham Greens which is a great place to go for roosting raptors.  We knew that our first evening was likely to be our dryest so I drove down a decidedly dodgy track to get to an area of saltmarsh where birds of prey are known to come in to roost leading up to dusk.  Over one and a half hours of watching, we saw several Marsh Harriers, both male and female, a female Merlin, a female or young Hen Harrier and at least two Barn Owls. I was also hoping for Short-eared Owl, but didn't manage to see one this time.

The Barn Owl was the only bird that came close enough to try some photography.  The light was fading so these aren't the best photos in the world, but they give a sense of this wonderful area. I have been here in the past when the setting sun has cast a glorious golden glow over this saltmarsh.  It's a great place to end a day's birding.

I'll have one more post from Norfolk to come soon.