The surprise of the trip for me was a visit back to a country lane Kay and once visited years ago (cleanse your minds!). Back then we sat in the car and watched a lapwing with chicks, and I reckoned the time might be right to find something similar. As it turned out there was more to see than I expected.
I thought the fences would be a problem for snaps, but using the car as a hide it was surprising how I could work around them, or blur the wire out.
As well as the snipe there were oystercatchers, redshank and curlew along the fence lines.
I saw this curlew a couple of days in the same spot. Obviously nesting, but I didn't push it.
Mostly the curlews were pretty wary, but one chose to walk in full view - definitely my best ever views.
Corvids too are usually wary, but the car helped with this jackdaw ....
and the oystercatchers.
Evening brought out the game birds - red legged partridge ....
and the inevitable pheasants.
It was great to see quite a few lapwing around .......
and when I saw this one trailing a wing (click on the snap for a larger view) I knew it probably wasn't because it had a problem. 
Sure enough after a few minutes a fairly well developed chick appeared. Only saw the one, but from my experience with the grouse there may well have been more scuttling around.
For a change there were a few mammals around too. The usual rabbits of course ......
some hares - a real treat for me as they are rarely seen where I live,
and to cap it all a few roe deer, including the buck in velvet which gave me one of my favourite snaps of the whole trip.
There were also yellowhammer, linnet and no doubt others I missed. I never thought this would have been a spot I wished I had more time to explore. I guess this is what most UK farmland would have been at one time, but all the set-aside schemes won't get us back there.
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