I popped over to Grove Ferry this morning, to meet some friends who were birding there. As I got out of my car I was greeted by the fabulous song of the Nightingale. Wordsworth, Keats and Milton all had a go at writing poems about the Nightingale, and even though I do like many poems by these masters, I don't think any of them get near to doing it justice. Just stand and listen, let the sound filter through your sense and tingle as it suddenly changes the speed and the pitch of its extraordinary song. Today was full bird song; Cetti's Warbler, so loud but without the melodic quality of the Nightingale; Blackcaps, masters in their own right; Whitethroats and Lesser Whitethroats, making up the numbers and the versatile Sedge Warbler, with lots of good imitations, but too hurried to b a maestro.
On the way to the David Feast hide I stopped to play hide and seek with this Sedge Warbler. He kept popping up, but never allowed a full shot. Sedge Warblers were numerous today, but I only heard a few Reed Warblers.
From the hide the noise of the Marsh Frogs was almost deafening at times. They fill up their air bags and then make a noise worse even than bag-pipes!
As I left there were three distant Hobbies hunting over the reeds, the first I've seen this year.
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