15th May..... Stone Curlew.

The tedium of a very long traffic queue this morning was broken by news from Mike, that a Stone Curlew had been seen in the north of the county. Unable to go due to the fact that work loomed at the end of the queue. My thoughts went back to the roosting bird I'd seen at the same site distantly through a heat haze a few years ago, which became more active in the evening. With this in mind I made the forty minute trip in the evening arriving at 7-15, I'd not been there long & Rob arrived who initial found the bird just after daybreak, as I checked out the juvenile Lapwings, he quickly re-found it actively feeding out in the middle of the main meadow, along with 3 Curlews & a chorus of Skylarks. At one point it really tugged at something in the earth, giving good 'scope views as it did so, but to far off for the camera, just took the one heavily cropped poor shot below.
Don.