The Long Nanny-Terns

Another visit to the Long Nanny this time via Newton which is a much shorter walk, the Warden team now well encamped , and the area roped off , the wardens where all young and very keen and enthusiastic I had a good talk with a young lady on her first assignment and what better place to start your career in conservation , I remarked that at some stage it would feel like she had been there for years but also at some stage it would all end and then seem like it had gone over  in a flash  but the memories would always be there. Apparently there where some 50 odd Little Terns and an unknown number of Arctic Terns at the time of my visit Terns where well spread on the beach  with some staking claim to sites in the Marram  Grass, amongst those on the beach where a couple of Little Gulls and a Sandwhich Tern , I had opted not to take the scope but it would have been worthwhile although there was a strong heathaze, not long after I had left a Great White Egret had dropped in and recently the report  of White Winged  Black Tern passing through , it really is a fantastic place and a stark contrast to my last visit , with another visit in the next week or so , it should be even better. The breeze off the sea was rather cold and also brought in a mist so I opted to go back through the dunes , only Wall Browns of note and a single Wheatear .

 Beadnell in the distance

 Arctic Tern just by the Wardens hut in the more flattened areas , they seem to have spread past the hut from what I remember from past visits

 I only had my SX50 camera with me and it's not very good with flight shots

 but I did manage to quickly get onto one of two Common Lizards that came onto to snap up an insect or three

 It made my day to see these and manage to get a photo

 I sat in the shelter of the dunes to have lunch with the company of a Reed Bunting singing close by

 A few Violets in the dunes I really must take a book and sort these out at some stage ,attractive nevertheless it's another world when you get right down on the ground

 Not seen these odd shaped Fungi before but have seen them since at Workworth ,another one to look up sometime

 Wall Browns a few around but flighty

 I like this wheatear especially amongst the flowers ,there is always a limit how close they will let you get

 Most of the day there was the sound of I can only describe as someone using a very clunky footpump in need of a good oiling , which turns out to be this which I could only partly see through the hedge near the carpark , which turns out to be a Guinea Fowl they also have Peacocks

 I presume this is a garden escape Cypress Spurge ?

And my last photo of the day as a Wall Brown settles