Little Stint, Bitterns, Garganey, Otter at Minsmere.

A planned trip to Minsmere See's us set off at 6 o'clock for the one hour 20 Min's journey.
When we arrive it's not a very nice morning weather wise,  a bit cloudy & windy, so with top coats on we head off to North wall looking for the Shrike that had been seen on Friday.
We are out of luck as there is no sign of it & nobody else had seen it today, so we walk off heading for East hide, on the way I hear & then see Beaded Tit, also pick out plenty of Sedge, & Red Warblers.
I then stop to look at some Greylag Geese that had some young gosling with them, you see these every where &  don't take much notice but today I looked at them & saw just how much colour is on them if you see them up close, so I stop to take some photo's of them & as I do an Otter ran across the path no more than a few yards in front of me, a really nice bonus to start the day off with.

Greylag 

Sitting in East hide a pair of Garganey are spotted, 2 Little Terns in the middle of the Scrape give me another year tick.
Then the Otter is seen swimming towards us & gives great views as it passe's in front of the hide.
On now to South hide where Jimmy picks out a Little Stint to give us all a year tick.
Loads of Kittiwakes plus Little Gull also seen.
We head back for a cuppa in the canteen, then head for the Bittern hide, Lot's of people in here who had never seen a Bittern, so when 3 fly up & give a great view a buzz goes round the hide, it's always nice to see the faces when people see a bird for the first time. We spend quite a long time in this hide watching many Marsh Harriers give us some good entertainment with some close ups, we even see a food pass that is always a nice thing to watch.

Brian's photo

We head down to Island Mere hide,not to much going on here, but we still stay for some time talking to some really nice people, I like this side of birding it's so nice to meet & talk & sometimes have a good laugh with them.
One Lady Was desperate to see a Bittern as she had missed it in the other hide when everybody else had seen  them, so she was over the moon when Jimmy tells us that a Bittern was heading towards the hide, it flies right up to the hide then drops down in the reeds at the side of the hide, this time she gets a really good view of it much to the pleasure of all of us all.
Just two year ticks today, but a a really nice day not chasing about to much.