Thursday 9th of February and a Dipper Pair
I don't remember how many times I have said that I love it when a plan comes together and so it proved again today. I described yesterday how I had built a hide close to a last years Dipper nest in the hope that they use the same site again. I had then seen a pair of birds together so I am certain that they have already paired up. When the day was sunny and bright today I couldn't wait to get back to see what else I could discover, would they be around the "hoped for" nest site? The hide was still perfectly hidden when I got there, and I slithered inside with a real squeeze. I had already seen one Dipper from quite a distance so I was confident that I would see one again before too long and thats exactly the way it happened. Last year I had noticed that the male preferred a mid-stream boulder not far from the nest and there he was, perched in the bright sunshine and singing away. (Yes Dippers sing beautifully.) It was just so thrilling to see him and know that my hide was working, no disturbance had been caused and I am pretty confident that they are going to nest somewhere nearby even if they don't use last year's nest. It wasn't long before the one bird was joined by his mate and she began to "dip" for food in the shallows. I lost sight of them from time to time, I hope that they are not building somewhere else, I'll just have to hope for the best. It was interesting to realise last year how secretive they were and how they tended to avoid the area in front of the nest for feeding so I am encouraged that they didn't use that area today.Like I say...... fingers crossed. After a while the male bird came midstream to a shallow area right by me but to my left and I excitedly took photographs. By now it was past 1 o'clock and the birds had moved away somewhere. I remembered that last year they had been totally absent in the afternoon and that's the way it seemed to be today so I packed up the gear and walked back to the car. As predicted, there they were up stream about 400 yards
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