WOW turned up two kingfishers which stayed around most of the day - and the next one as well. I can honestly say I have not had as prolonged, close views of kingfisher ever. They chased each other round the reeds, sat on posts, preened, washed and fished. Up till then we thought the highlight was the common sandpiper preening on the trestle right in front of the window, or the two ringed common terns we spotted, but we were proved wrong when the two kingfishers turned up. Kingfishers are occasional visitors to WOW, usually in August/September when the youngsters are chased out by the parents. They do not usually stay long and very rarely give good views. There are fish in the reserve but nowhere they can safely breed so they usually move on. The deeper pools have given them a chance to fish and they are catching small fish. Hopefully they will be a more regular feature at WOW. Let's start with the common sandpiper on the trestle which was there for 15 - 20 minutes.
The kingfishers pitched up later and were still around when I left after an hour plus of watching them. They also showed well over the weekend and were enjoyed by quite a few folk who posted photos on the RSPB WOW Facebook page here:
https://www.facebook.com/groups/RSPBBelfastWOW
This week the male kingfisher was still doing its stuff and we had a couple of ruff and a greenshank. There was a third ringed common tern which has been forwarded to the relevant people. The two terns from last week came from the Blue Circle island in Larne Lough and the South Wall in Dublin - ringed as a chick in June 2021.
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| Ruff |
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| Ruff |
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| Alcedo athis |
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| Ringed tern, white PNP - best I could do! |
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