Early Morning Dipper

This morning I was up before dawn to visit a beauty spot which I knew would be very busy later. It was wonderful to have it to myself for a couple of hours, and to be heading home just as many others were arriving. The highlights of this outing included a green woodpecker, albeit fleetingly, a stoat, too quick for a photo, and this dipper which was most obliging in allowing itself to be photographed as it made its way along the brook, feeding with its head stuck below water for much of the time. If ever you are lucky enough to get close-up views of a dipper, you might see the white lid which flashes across its eye captured in this photo