Storm Eunice.. and others.

I have now finished the RSPB Beached bird survey, covering the stretch from Cleethorpes leisure centre down to Tetney haven.
I decided due to the adverse weather conditions a few weeks ago, to do this survey on two separate dates. Therefore I did it on Feb 22nd, and March 3rd.
To do this stretch in one complete trek is impossible due to saltmarsh, deep creeks and the mudflats. So, some of this was walked along the sand dunes and embankment (2km on the first survey, and 1km on the second one) This gave me a walk of 6km and 7km respectively along the tideline as it receded in each instance. I also retraced my steps back to my starting point each time too, effectively doing each journey twice.
Encouragingly, the only casualty I encountered was on the first walk. One solitary wing from an Oystercatcher. I did encounter a carcass of an Oystercatcher in the sand dunes along the path that runs near the Fitties (100 meters from the beach and above sea level) when I had to navigate around the mud before returning to the beach. This I think was either a Peregrine or fox predation.
The beach was very clean, no signs of chemical contamination, with only driftwood, the odd tangle of fishing line and the tourist litter i.e. bottles/shoes/crispbags (surprisingly, not that much this far out on the tideline).
There were large numbers of waders, huge flocks of Oystercatchers/Redshank/Sanderling/Curlew etc, Cormorants aplenty on the sandbars, Egrets and Geese... a very healthy population of life for a small stretch of beach.

Hi Nick,

I would be interested in seeing the results of  the survey you took part in. Hopefully, more successful than my attempt at the monthly WeBS count along the Humber today - a bit breezy and damp to say the least!

In light of the recent storms along our coast, especially my local stretch (Cleethorpes down to Tetney marshes) it will be interesting to see what impact this has had on our bird numbers. How it has affected our residents, and what others took shelter here too.
I am scheduled to do the RSPB Beached bird survey tomorrow, from Humberston up to Tetney Haven. If anyone is interested, I will post my results on the forum after the survey.