I had a wonderful day with Simon Barnes at the end of August when we took in a few birds left by the fall of the previous weekend. One of the birds we visited was a Wryneck at Salthouse, found earlier by my good friend Trevor.
Wrynecks are one of those birds that hark back to their dinosaur origins. They have a fascinating reptilian like appearance. This individual was as showy as it could get. From the moment we arrived it was sitting up in the top of bushes and parading around on the shingle. I took a few snaps and it was in my mind to get something better when I had the time to return, sit and wait for the bird to come closer.
The Wryneck obviously had other ideas. I was writing up reports the following day but gave myself a break from working mid-morning and drove to Salthouse expecting to photograph the bird and be on my way home in an hour, an hour and a half at most. Three hours later I was still looking for the damn thing! Although reported earlier, it had gone to ground. It did eventually show but had undergone some sort of character morph from the previous day and remained distant. It took a further hour before the bird ventured close enough for some half decent shots.
Letter From Norfolk 