Birds of Luxé prairies

 The Luxé prairies lie along the north bank of the Charente river just east of the bridge at Luxé Gare. Part of the area is poplar plantation but most is wet meadows which are crossed by the new railway viaduct.

The natural wetland areas of Charente have long since been destroyed by drainage and agricultural practice and the nearest that you can get to such habitats are these parts of the river valleys which are subject to flooding. This particular one is interesting for several bird species and a few recent visits have produced snipe, green plover, zitting cisticola, water pipit, water rail (heard only) and black wood pecker.

The river itself is particularly wide just above and below the weir at Echoisie and alongside the expected kingfisher, cormorant, grey wagtail and mallard I was surprised to find a goldeneye earlier in the year. So surprised in fact that I did not recognise it at first despite having seen the species several times when I was living on the Isle of Wight. It stayed around for a couple of weeks as it seemed to find plenty to eat from its constant diving.

The 350 or so cranes which I saw on a recent trip to the prairies confirmed  that they are definitely moving back northwards but you’ll have to take my word for their direction on this photo..

And here are a few pics of the species I mentioned earlier Matching them up should not be too difficult.