Approaching from the east I saw the female marsh harrier over the reedbed, and a buzzard. I had barely sat down in the hide at around 10.45 when the pallid harrier exploded out of the reeds 50 metres in front of the hide, flew towards me and then west at point blank range. Eye-watering views. It flew on down the fen meadow, putting up around 1200 lapwing and 3-400 golden plover. After causing chaos for a few minutes it made its way up the Gupton fields and disappeared over the ridge. Photos entirely redundant after Alan's efforts yesterday (and Dave O's the other day), and I left it late to pick up the camera, just enjoying the view, but this was my best record shot.
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A peregrine tore through the lapwings in the distance by Starman's Hall. The lapwings and goldies were constantly in the air for the next half hour. Brian's 100+ fieldfare flock still around. Re Brian's little egrets, there have been up to 11 on the upper Corse recently (8 in this photo) though no sign of the GWE for a few days.
Making my way back to the track it was a pleasure to meet Dave and Lisa, who had approached from Gupton and were ploughing through the mud on the track. Returning through the fen meadow east of the hide I put up a jack snipe, my first there in a while. With a red kite near the Speculation Inn and a merlin in the hedge near Kingsmill, a great day for raptors.