Woodchat Shrike, Dawlish Warren

I would have been very pleased to get a better picture of this bird (seen today) but as it's the first I have seen in Devon (and the UK),  I am more than happy. As soon as I heard about it's appearance on the Warren at Dawlish this morning, I decided to make my way out there, infact I was already planning a trip because I had also learned of the presence of my "bogey bird" a Wryneck also on the Warren this morning.  As soon as I reached the area of Greenland Lake, on the Warren, the presence of the bird and its location was obvious by the small cluster of birders who had it's image in their various optics. It was pointed out to me at quite a distance on the fence line, 75yards away or so and thats about as close as most people could get to it.  After lingering for a while I made my way down to the point to look for the very elusive Wryneck and failed to find it which was a bit of a disappointment, but it is my bogey bird as I said and I am still, yet to photograph one.  So, I made my way back up to the area of the Woodchat Shrike to see if I could get some nicer pictures. There waas still cluster of birders but all different to the ones there 3 hours previously and it wasn't long before I could see the bird with a good indicator being the direction of the lenses. I decided on a different strategy. Realising that this young juvenile bird was described as mobile, I decided to sit myself down reasonably close to a bush that had some exposed high dead branches. I thought that if I was a Woodchat shrike, I might pick that bush to fly to. There were a lot of non-birding walkers who were oblivious to the presence of the bird and unfortunately these innocent walkers were flushing the bird on a regular basis. I guessed that it was going to be only a matter of a wait before it landed in the tree….. and it did.  So, some kind of photo after all and a new species for my Devon Bird Gallery.