Bit of a red letter day today with 3 yearticks and my 250th species for Titchwell.

Started off well with a drake garganey (123) on the grazing marsh which later moved onto the fresh marsh and the first 'grunting' bittern of the season was on the edge of the grazing marsh. Then came the radio message from Dave, '6 cranes heading west along the ridge', the office emptied and we ran up to the main road to see the six birds slowly drifting west along the main road. They are always awesome birds to see(124). The best was still to come...

While out on a guided walk, Dave radioed to see if I had looked at my pager. I had left it in the office so didn't know what was heading our way. 'Alpine swift heading west from Holkham' was his reply. Having missed two a couple of years ago I was hoping that it would contuine towards us. At about 15:20, on our way back, I picked up the bird distantly over the saltmarsh towards Gypsy Lane heading our way. The bird flew directly towards us over the reedbed and right overhead at about 30ft before disapearing on to Holme (125). I managed to contact the NOA who had the bird continue west.
A fantastic bird to make the 250 landmark.