The Return of the Sand Martins

There is a specific location at Radipole Lake Reserve Weymouth where Sand Martins have nested every Spring in what is best described as a Bank. 

They arrive each year in late March and start refurbishing their old nesting sites in the bank.

This location is quite difficult to get a good view of. The only way is to observe it sideways on at a distance from an Observation point known as the North Screen. Any meaningful photography is not easy. I was using the equivalent lens in micro four thirds terms of a 600mm f4 with a 1.4 converter attached. This totalled 840mm. The location is surrounded by tall reeds and the birds approach quite low at high spreed across obscured water each time bringing nesting materials and food. At times the entry of the holes gets quite crowded as you can observe from the first two images. The posted images are also cropped quite considerably.

From my initial observations I believe the birds are still refurbishing the nest as yet and appeared to be carrying nesting material.

All the same I hope you like the images such as they are.