Country diary: the marshes are teeming with waders

Keyhaven, Hampshire: The brent geese feeding on the grassland are restless, but not because of the people walking along the skyline above themThe mudflats are still, but first impressions are deceptive. On a grey, raw day, we stop on the bridge across the Avon Water as it enters the Keyhaven Marshes. The tide is out, gulls mill in the air, but below us the glutinous foreground seems devoid of life. As our eyes settle to what we are seeing, we realise how misleading those first impressions are. The mudflats are teeming with waders. We've left the binoculars in the car and so don't attempt identification until one long-legged, straight-billed bird wades out to feed, head-down into the stream. In this murky light, it's impossible to see markings but surely this is a black-tailed godwit. We press on along the Solent Way, a track lined with lichen-festooned bushes. Near the village, the lichens are mostly orange with shades of pastel green where different varieties fight for possession of the branches. Some of these pale species are so dense that from afar they look like sprigs of meadowsweet thrusting up through the hedgerow. Continue reading...