A day at Slimbridge WWT

A couple of weekends ago I went with two of my birding friends to Slimbridge Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust . This reserve lies on the banks of the River Severn about 90 minutes north of Frome. For more information on the reserve you can click on the link. To be honest, it's not somewhere I go to often. It's not cheap to get in and also most of what is there are collections of wildfowl from around the world, interesting but not wild.

There are parts of the reserve that are set up for watching wild birds though and there happened to be two or three good year ticks here. This (below) is the view from the Zeiss hide. If you click to enlarge this photo, you will see more clearly the River Severn in the background and beyond that, Wales. From here we watched an energetic Red necked Phalarope, spinning and twisting after food on the water (when are they ever not energetic!) (-: This is a bird that I certainly don't get to see every year, so was a real treat. We also picked up Curlew Sandpipers, Spotted Redshanks and Little Stints, all good yearbird waders (shorebirds).
It's hard to walk around Slimbridge and not take the opportunity for photos of exotic birds! Flamingos are certainly birds that I'm not going to see anytime soon away from Slimbridge!

They're amazing looking birds. It would be great to see them in their natural habitat sometime!

On the other hand, Common Crane is a bird that I can get to see in Britain, usually in just one area of Norfolk on the eastern side of Britain. At present, Slimbridge are in the process of rearing young Common Cranes with a view to releasing them into the wild somewhere on the Somerset Levels, which is an exciting prospect as that is very local to me!

I took these photos through a wired fence into the rearing compound and unfortunately never got a good shot of the whole bird.

My mind was mostly on birds on this day, but I did notice someone else taking a photo of this clump of fungi. It looks like some sort of Fairy city to me! (-:

Here are some more of the exotic wildfowl in the collection here. This is a very pretty female Mandarin Duck. They have successfully maintained a feral population in Britain and I've actually seen them on the River Churn at the bottom of my Mum's garden in the Cotwolds.

I took this photo just a little too late. These three ducks (not sure what type they are) were all upright and alert and looked just like the duck equivalent of Meerkats! The one of the left just started to move at I took my shot which is a shame.

I should've been more attentive as to names for some of these wildfowl, so I don't know what this goose is called (white headed something or other), but I liked they way it kept straining up to reach this twig. Not sure what it was after!

They also have a compound with Otters here. These photos were taken behind glass or perspex so arn't entirely sharp. It was lovely to have the opportunity to watch these beautiful creatures up close as they twisted and writhed in the water after a giant cube of frozen fish was chucked in there for their lunch.

This Moorhen is a wild bird that has become pretty much used to close human activity so I was able to get reasonably close to take a couple of shots.

My favourite subject of the day though has to be this Moorhen chick. Look at the feet on this fluffball! It posed beautifully for me, first to the left....

.......have a preen.....

......preen the other side....

.......and face right. So sweet! Have a good life matey!

We had a good day here and it was well worth the entrance fee!