22nd June - cloudy, light SW/S wind, short light showers later

A early rise today ensured I made it to Titchwell for 7-00am, why?  A Great Knot has been present for a few days and finally I decided to go for it, yes a 'twitch' .  A Great Knot resides in the Far East, breeding in NE Siberia and wintering south as far as India -Australia, this is said to be the 7th record for the UK.

To be continued....finally time to do this.  I explored the Freshmarsh to begin with where the Great Knot had been seen on a number of occasions - few few Red Knot, but GK absent, then to the shore - absent. Breakfast was enjoyed sitting on the sand dunes in the sunshine, when I met a couple of locals who were there and saw the bird at 0430h, before it flew off with Red Knot.  I decided to explore the reserve further and hopefully await its return.  About 1145h  news came it was at Scolt Head island, just down the coast a couple of mile.  I decide to chance it and headed off to Brancaster beach car park, then a 11/2mile trek along the shore to Scolt Head island.  On reaching there a couple of other birders were present, the news was if flew off 15 seconds ago with a 1000 Red Knot, fortunately these landed in the channel and island shore so the searching began.  Slowly a few more birders made the trek and started searching, after an hour of looking through some 2000 Red Knot, still nothing, of course during this time they often flew around to new areas of the shore or disappeared from view.  More searching, ....then I exclaimed I had it in view, this quickly got everyone else wanting to know where it was - well the shore/mud and rocks covered with 2000 Red Knot (well actually mostly 'grey' this time of year) all looks very similar, fortunately with guidance others got on it and eventually the last person in the group saw it.  As expected it and all the other Knot, flew off west to feed on the mussel beds. Mission accomplished.  It was also nice to see two Spoonbills in the channel feeding.

While at Titchwell there is always plenty to see, there were six Spotted Redshank and two Little Gulls on the Freshmarsh.  A good number of Bearded Tits were seen, some in family parties.  On the adjacent field a barn Owl hunted.

Avocets were busy with young, Black-tailed Godwits, Curlew, Little-ringed plover and other waders were seen, three Marsh Harriers were over the reeds.  Little, Sandwich and Common Terns were all showing.  In all I saw about 90 species around Titchwell.  A Wood Pigeon was having a doze on a fence, a close look shows just how attractive they are.

There is much more to Titchwell than birds, this time of year there are many flowers blooming, the restricted Southern Marsh Orchid being one, among many.

Southern Marsh Orchid

Viper's Bugloss