Methley Little Bustard

I was left speechless when I checked my phone at breakfast to discover a male Little Bustard was at Methley, West Yorkshire! Vicky was at work and I had four kids to sort - panic! Fortunately, the owner of the two additional kids agreed to take their's back and my two too, so by 9am, my optics were in the car and I was heading south.

A short drive later and some kind gent let me look through his scope and I was amazed to see an absolutely stonking male Little Bustard casually walking around in a cut meadow, happily feeding. Scenes!

About 30 birders were squeezed on to a permissive path and the bird was showing about 150m away in the field behind the cows. Wearing shorts was a bad idea - Nettles! The LB walked about for the next 20 minutes or so, showing it's black and white neck and breast. The white on the foreneck met in a V, almost looking as if the bird was wearing a medal round it's neck! At about 10am it retired into the long grass at the foot of the far fence. It had a little preen and then hunkered down for a break. I gave it a while but it didn't reappear so though I best get back to Dad duties. A quick and dirty twitch and unbelievably my second Little Bustard in Yorkshire, following the bird at Fraisthorpe on New Year's Eve, 2014.