Flash of blue brilliance

Due to family commitments I spent the weekend in Hereford. The woods and hills around the city can be worth visiting in the spring and winter for some decent woodland birding, it's still a stronghold for birds such as Lesser Spotted Woodpecker and Marsh Tit. The Lugg and Wye valleys are home to some decent floodplains and a few gravel pits which attract migrant and wintering waterfowl. On Saturday I spent a couple of hours birding at Wellington gravel pits, just north of the city. Wellington turns up odds and sods, this year I've seen Osprey and Garganey there,  on Saturday I scanned all the waterfowl flocks and watched the hedgerows carefully for migration action. The migrant highlight was two male Yellow Wagtails overhead and calling with eight Pied Wagtails and 18 Meadow Pipits, the most numerous migrant was Swallow, I counted 185 through. Coot and Tufted Duck numbers are building up on the pits and I counted 28 Great Crested Grebes. A gull roost was made up exclusively of Lesser black backs, 144 of them. As I walked past one of the smaller pits, listening to a Chiffchaff, a flash of blue brilliance sped past me, fortunately I caught up with the Kingfisher and I managed a couple of dodgy didgyscoped shots (see below). Other highlights for me were eight Teal, a female Wigeon, twelve Buzzards, two Ravens and a Green Woodpecker.