... twice shy

I didn't think I'd actually managed to get the bittern on its fly past, it was only in view for a few seconds and quickly went behind some intervening vegetation.  So I was rather delighted to find this shot waiting for me when I got back to look at my results in detail.  Bitterns are more frequent than they used to be, but they are very secretive, well camouflaged birds so you don't see them that often. They are amazingly unlikely looking things aren't they?

Having been promising us rain today it became clear on looking at last night's forecast that the rain wouldn't actually get to us until the early afternoon, and that we were due another unseasonably warm start to the day.  Sure enough the first part of the day has a balmy 15C (feeling much warmer in the sunshine) but it is starting to cloud over now.   

A cautious conversation with some of the other owners of cameras with long lenses, who you can find clustering (flocking?) at nature reserves and looking for wildlife to photograph, confirmed our universal belief in the impact of climate change, and the need to urgently do something about it.  I say cautious, because there are those who seem convinced that climate change  isn't real and that it's all just a plot by someone or other for their own nefarious reasons.  It would be nice to just write off climate change deniers as the same sort of people who believe in other unlikely conspiracy theories but there does seem to be something about modern (social) media that enables outlandish and potentially harmful theories to positively thrive.  But then, I suppose humanity has always been a bit like this... burn the witch I say ...