Two spoonbills which have been staying for most if not all of the winter on the RSPB Bowling Green Marsh Reserve at Topsham. Not only were they standing so far from the hide that they’re tiny in the shots on my camera, which had only limited telephoto range. One of the pair was placed as if deliberately hiding behind the nearby cormorant.
Category: David
Devon violets: white violets by a lane
More mid-February Devon violets in flower. These were growing in the roadside by the dead-end quiet lane which runs along the RSPB Bowling Green Marsh Reserve in Topsham.
Waders wading, Goat Walk
Our visit to the Exe estuary this year was timed so that I was seeing the river when the tide was low, so most of the waders were feeding way too far away for me to get any clear pictures of them feeding – apart from this smallish group which came closer to the Goat Walk at Topsham one morning.
Devon violets: Topsham churchyard
Mid-February, and already the violets in the favoured climate near the south Devon coast were fully in flower. These were in a clump which were growing in the churchyard at Topsham.
Turnstones turning
The Exe estuary at low tide has huge expanses of exposed soft mud, pullulating with invertebrates. That, together with its temperate climate, make it an important site for large flocks of overwintering birds: geese, ducks, waders and more.
When the water’s out, there’s usually a handful of turnstones close to the Goat Walk at Topsham. They wander, more or less as a group, from one clump of seaweed to another, probing the ground searching for things to eat.
Gaudy sunset, Exe estuary
A gaudy sunset, probably the most vivid one I’ve ever seen, looking over the Exe estuary at Topsham. Pictures taken with a mobile phone camera, so the white balance varies from shot to shot. In my memory, the light was even redder than it appears in any of the pictures in the sequence.
Early blooming narcissi
Narcissi with the flowers already open almost a fortnight ago, on the pavement of a quiet residential street.
Elf cup time
Scarlet elf cups are fungi which produce their brightly coloured fruiting bodies just about this time of year. I’ve not managed to get out to look for them at any of their usual spots this year for various reasons. So here’s some pictures I took a few years ago.
Clump of snowdrops, Bantock
Under the trees at Bantock Park. near to the flowering crocuses, one of the clumps of snowdrops.
Let sleeping ducks … float
A pair of the mallards on the lake at West Park, still quite early one morning, both asleep.
Purple crocus, Bantock
Yards away from the yellow crocuses in Bantock Park, clumps with purple flowers were not quite as fully open.
Shovellers, resting
A couple of the shovellers which overwinter on the lake at West Park. For once they weren’t busily swimming in tight circles, hoovering the surface of the water for food. They were about as near as they ever come to the shore, resting. The female actually asleep.