Red-Necked Grebe : Roath Park Lake, Cardiff

Although I've seen a few over the years I'd never photographed a Red-Necked Grebe so my mission today was to try and get some photos of the juvenile bird that had turned up on the lake a week ago but wasn't properly identified until the middle of last week.
My first port of call though was the Ogmore-By-Sea to try and also photograph the Red-Breasted Merganser which unusually and chosen to linger on the river opposite Portobello House for the last couple of days.
There was an extremely high tide when I arrived at 8.15am and there were very few birds present which included my target bird, within minutes of me arriving a pair of shooting twats turned up on the opposite side of the river and quickly brought down a Canada Goose and male Mallard.
They even had a go at shooting a pair of flyover Goosanders but luckily for the birds the shorter chubby twat missed !!
I have heard of shooting at the site but had never witnessed it before and suffice to say they scared off every living creature within half a mile.
I'll be shaming the twats on social media and may report them to the police.

Having 'dipped' on the merganser I headed on to Cardiff and met up with Paul Bowden who wanted to try my big lens, it was also nice to bump into Colin Harvey, Della and Hadyn Lack, Dave Palmer and later Cliff Woodhead.
The grebe never came close enough for any really meaningful photos but I came away with some 'record' shots that I was reasonably pleased with........

Crymlyn Burrows Wader Roost

I resisted the temptation to visit the Gann Estuary at Dale in Pembrokeshire yesterday for the pair of Baird's Sandpipers having decided that I wouldn't get any better photos than I took of the one at Kenfig in 2016 and so decided to stay closer to home with a visit to Crymlyn Burrows for the high tide wader roost.
I got there on a dropping tide and there were good numbers of birds present with a small group of c10 Red Knot, c30 Dunlin, c150 Sanderling, c 100 Ringed Plover, c 200 Oystercatcher and a large mixed group of gulls.
Much as I searched I couldn't find anything scarce amongst the flock but after a couple of hours I was able to get a little closer to the birds as they became used to me and I came away with some photos especially of the Red Knot that I was quite pleased with........

Wood Sandpipers : Watermill Flood, Ogmore

This evening I made a quick dash down to Ogmore after work in an attempt to connect with the two Wood Sandpipers that had been found earlier in the afternoon on the Watermill Flood.
Upon arrival I was greeted by Terry Tovey who offered me a view through his 'scope of the birds that were still there favouring the far side of the flood.
The birds were always distant and I could only manage some record shots, as I was about to leave Ceri Jones and his wife turned up and it was nice to meet them for the first time.....