{"id":90314,"date":"2026-02-22T18:44:52","date_gmt":"2026-02-22T18:44:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/?p=90314"},"modified":"2026-02-22T18:44:52","modified_gmt":"2026-02-22T18:44:52","slug":"birding-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/2026\/02\/22\/birding-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Birding…"},"content":{"rendered":"

It was this sort of day at Titchwell on the North Norfolk coast:<\/p>\n

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And this sort of day:<\/p>\n

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And on the beach, once you walked 100 metres from the end of the reserve path, you were almost on your own:<\/p>\n

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Three birds stood out in the day. There were beautiful pintails, which are right up there in the echelons of good-looking ducks:<\/p>\n

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They were swimming this way, and that:<\/p>\n

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And like gadwall and teal, they tend to go through life in male and female pairs.<\/p>\n

They eat off the bottom of shallow water, the male on the right and the female on the left. Only the male is really pintailed:<\/p>\n

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Then there was a turnstone on the beach, which I suspect most people never noticed. In my best shot, the wind had got to it:<\/p>\n

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As I said, though, I went for sanderling. And that wall down that wide-open, almost-empty beach was to find them. And we did. The photos are not 100%, but you will note the sea is sharp: the birds were faster. These two pictures capture their beautiful essence as they rush along the shoreline in search of food, literally on the edge of the tide.<\/p>\n

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I love that reflection.<\/p>\n

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To put these birds in context, they are smaller than a sparrow but with longer legs, and they migrate to Greenland, Iceland or Svalbard. They weigh around 70g on average.<\/p>\n

But this was my favourite shot of the day. It's just a reed in one of the lagoons:<\/p>\n

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Days like that make me remember why this planet is worth caring for.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It was this sort of day at Titchwell on the North Norfolk coast: And this sort of day: And on the beach, once you walked
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