The Laguna de Navaseca was superb yesterday. It really is a tiny gem. Only 15km from the Tablas National Park which is beautiful, orderly and expansive, the Navaseca is small, dumpy and smelly. But that doesn´t affect anything. It always performs. It has ducks, waders, egrets, harriers flamingos and rails to say the least. And all this packed into the space of about two hectares. Take yesterday for example. Quite excellent birding it was. There were the two winter visitors shown here, a Green Sandpiper and a Common Sandpiper.

Whilst these birds normally winter in Africa they can sometimes winter in southern Europe, and in the case of the Common Sandpiper, this is more the exception than the rule. It always strikes me as to how small these birds actually are when you see them up close, particularly the Common one. It is miniscule.

But it was not just these two with their photogenic posing nearby that made the day. Other notable sightings were 5 Purple Swamphens, a dozen or so White-headed Ducks, a half dozen juvenile Flamingos, 2 Marsh Harriers, a pair of Bluethroats, a Water Pipit and a pair of Reed Buntings. More on some of these in another post.

Purple Swamphen (Porphyrio porphyrio)