Mike's Photographs : Not a great day out but not bad either.

Thursday, June 1, 2023

Not a great day out but not bad either.

I took myself off down to Delaware yesterday after learning about the Dupont Nature Center and seeing on their Webcam a lady sitting on a beach surrounded by hundreds if not thousands of shorebirds. Oh yeah, that's where I want to be. Heading down there it looked to be a slight hazy sky as dawn broke but it clouded over and was foggy in places by the time I arrived. When I got to the Dupont Nature Center it was high tide, cold, windy and with a heavy overcast. Not ideal for photography. I headed a little further South East to Prime Hook National Wildlife Refuge. Being further inland it was out of the wind but I didn't stay long due to the hordes of blood sucking mosquito's. After a coffee stop I headed back to Dupont but was sadly disappointed when I asked how to get to where the lady on the webcam was.The answer was you can't. She was part of a Shorebird Monitoring Group and they go out by boat because you can't get there by foot. Damnit, foiled again. OK then, I headed up to Port Mahon where it was much better conditions other than the developing heat haze as the temperature rose. I carried on to Bombay Hook and walked the Boardwalk Trail hoping for close Seaside Sparrows and Marsh Wrens. By this time it was past noon and 85F (29.4C) and the heat haze was nasty along with the biting Green-headed Flies. I did manage to find a reasonably cooperative Marsh Wren, not very close but I'm reasonably pleased with the images. There were several stunning Summer plumaged Black-bellied Plovers but with the distance and the heat they're unusable, so I suppose it needs a still, cool early morning and loads of bug spray. Anyway, here's Wednesday's images in chronological/alphabetical order.