After an enthralling morning at Fowlmere watching the harrier joust, time for a visit to one of the most famous birding spots in Hertfordshire on our way home, the Ashwell dung-heaps. The importance to local birders of these heaps is seasonal, as it is only for a few weeks in the Spring and Autumn that they attract migrants such as wagtails and Wheatears, although I am sure they provide a source of food to the resident birds throughout the year.
There are in fact two dung-heaps just outside Ashwell on the Eyeworth road. One is huge, about the height of a double-decker bus and the other covers a much larger area, but is only a foot or so deep. Today there were no birds on the tall heap, but the larger heap is active and attracting lots of flies and therefore attracting the most birds.
Unfortunately we didn't arrive until the afternoon so the sun was warming up the heap in addition to the manure self-generated heat creating an intense heat haze even at short range which made photography difficult. Interestingly, the extent of the haze depending on the direction you were looking, presumably due to heat hot-spots. The first bird along was this Red Kite which temporarily scattered the smaller birds.
The majority of the birds feeding on the heap were wagtails with up to six Pied Wagtails.
Amongst them was just a single White Wagtail.
There were also 12 of their colourful cousins, the Yellow Wagtail.
But the stars of the show today were the three Wheatears, one of my favourite birds.
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