About this walk

You needn’t own a top of the range pair of binoculars to be able to tell your Peewit from your Green Plover (even though they are the same) or sketch accurate, artistic images of your sightings onto your notepad using the pencil hanging round your neck. It isn’t necessary to babble on about which is really the smallest bird in Britain (the Firecrest, though some say the Goldcrest) to any poor soul who will listen. Just using your senses well is sufficient, feeling a little bit of wonder when you spot the notorious Dartmoor Buzzard is also good and realising that occasionally you actually may have to wear an anorak; particularly when it rains, is just plain sensible.

Birds you are likely to see…

Ring Ouzel, Redstart, Wheatear, Whinchat, Pied and Spotted Flycatcher, Wood Warbler in woodlands and open moorland, Gooseander on the River Dart

Birds you are likely to Hear…

Grasshopper Warbler, Stonechat
Cuckoo.  In the evenings at Bellever Forset – Nightjar and Woodcock, Tawny Owl and out early on the moor – Snipe “drumming with dead mens bones” spooky!

Rarities…

Black-throated Thrush, Black Stork, Iberian Chiffchaff, Black Kite, Montagu’s Harrier, Common Crane, Dotterel, Stone Curlew, Golden Oriole, Wryneck, Hoopoe, Yellow-browed Warbler, Common Rosefinch and Snow Bunting.