Kennell Vale Dipper

I revisited Kennell Vale again today looking for Dipper sightings,  It had been eight months since I last saw any here but today was to be the day,  I moved upstream from the lower stone bridge that had proved successful back in March checking all the nooks and crannies as I went, I saw a flash of wings move into one of the dark wheel pits of one of the derelict gunpowder mills, Waited quietly at a fair distance and eventually out popped a lovely Dipper to begin foraging in one of the many waterfalls and eddies,  I soon realised that I was on the wrong side of the river working against the bright sunlight that was filtering through the trees so I retraced my steps back to the stone bridge and progressed back up on the right side and was pleased to see that the bird was still foraging in the same location,  The Dipper appeared quite successful at finding several nymph prey under the rushing waters and I eventually achieved the last two images in this blog showing the behaviour of the dipper with prey which it took to a single half submerged stone each time and beat the nymph against it to remove twigs and debris that it had collected and attached to its body as camouflage and protection,  It was then quickly dispatched by the Dipper. I also posted a montage of three images showing the Dipper moving up through the waterfalls