I’ve blogged about our local Shelducks (Tadorna tadorna) before, in How many Shelducks?, 9 October 2019 and Hoovering Shelduck, 25 February 2025. They’re stunning waterfowl that look a bit like a cross between a duck and a goose, coloured by an enthusiast child with bright paints and a vivid imagination.

It’s only occasionally that I manage close views of them, as the Cardiff Bay birds spend most of their local visiting time on the distant mud flats between the Barrage and the Bristol Channel, so I appreciate all the more the times when I can sit on a bench and watch them going about their day, as happened last week at RSPB Lodmoor.