Slimbridge

We spent a fabulous day yesterday at Slimbridge Waterfowl Park. We took a day excursion with South West Coaches. The weather was glorious all day - no wind, no clouds, just sunshine. We were greeted at the entrance by a heron just basking in the sun. It seemed as though he was inviting us to enjoy the day with him.

The first pool is full of swans, various kinds of ducks, geese, moorhens and coots. The great thing is that a lot of the birds are free to go where they want while the human visitors have to stay on the designated paths. The children love this part as they can get really close to the birds and enjoy feeding them.

A woman (not me) feeding the geese

Further along there are enclosures where they ask you not to feed them as they are from different parts of the world and have a more specialised diet that is catered for by the staff. There were swans, geese and ducks of all colours.




The smew

The white one is called a smew. There were ones with blue bills from South America.




Argentine Ruddy Duck



Puna Teal from the Andes

The strangest one we saw was referred to as the missing link between geese, swans, and game birds. It was called a Crested Screamer, although we didn't hear it 'scream'. 



Crested Screamer

We saw baby coots barely a few days old. There were birds that were large like the flamingoes and others that were so small and looked very delicate like the Red Shank and Avocet.



Avocet



We had quite a long conversation with another visitor who had a camera with an absolutely enormous zoom lens on it who admitted that for her watching and photographing wildlife was not a hobby but rather an obsession. Looking at some of her photographs made me feel a bit like hiding my little digital camera. She was a very interesting lady who obviously enjoyed her single life, sharing it with creation.

To crown it all, when we got back in the coach for the return journey, we discovered while chatting to the driver that he was originally from Gateshead! (for those who don't know, that is just the other side of the river from our place of origin) In July he is taking a group on a tour of the North East, spending time at Alnwick, Bamburgh, the Farne Islands and the obligatory fish and chip dinner at Seahouses. Mmm! Sounds like a good idea to me!