Southsea Sandpipers

Rounding off an intense day of birding along the south coast with a visit to the wintering flock of Purple Sandpipers on the shoreline below Southsea Castle. Brilliant little characters, and often very well behaved subjects, given a bit of patience. They took little notice of the camera, and were quite content on hyper-actively searching amongst the rocks for small invertebrates. Give it less than a month and these birds will be returning to the cold, bare Arctic tundra to breed. Hardy little sods.