A lovely walk ....

...... this morning from the Marloes Mere car park to the Deer Park. The key objective was to see a Wheatear - we succeeded in this and saw about 7. Three were feeding avidly in a patch of heather in the big open grassy area between the Iron Age Fort and the Rath and there were more on the Deer Park including one female. There were really impressive numbers of Skylarks  - either singing or flying around in pairs. We were able to hear a skylark (often several) singing all the time we were walking which was wonderful. Plenty of parachuting pipits too. Other things were not rare or spectacular - just the lovely stuff you would expect here at this of the year. A male Stonechat in the hedge near the hide was actually singing, there were Chiffchaffs in the sallows, and a pair of Little Grebes were trilling right under the hide and seemed to be competing with a pair of Moorhens and a Coot for nesting rights under the sallows. A Chough was doing extreme aerobatics, diving around with his wings completely closed, and a group of 7 Ravens over Wooltack point seemed to consist of local nesting birds coming together for a bit of a do - when the group broke up they all flew off in different directions. Lastly there was a kestrel hunting over our heads for about 10 minutes as we walked along. And of course, there was sunshine......