A week or more ago I did a guided walk on Halvergate Marshes for the local authority. A lovely crowd of people assembled at Wickhampton Church (worth a visit for the medieval wall paintings) before we had an enjoyable few hours out on the marsh. We saw quite a lot but missing from the days bird list were Common Cranes. It wasn’t until I started to head home after lunch when I’d only gone a few miles that I saw a flock of twenty seven birds at the roadside … I couldn’t get them all in one shot! This is a good number for East Norfolk. I’ve rarely seen more within the county in a single group.
The UK still trails the continent on numbers though. I recall seeing around ten thousands coming into roost in Hungry within the Hortobagy National Park during a visit in October 2007. Closer to home in the Lac du Der region just to the East of Paris during early March 2015 in the last 2 hours of light I watched around twenty thousands of birds move North on gentle southerlies.
Letter From Norfolk 