It was wet and very dreary this morning so I delayed my visit until just after 10, I didn't think this would be too much of a problem though because yesterday I had not seen the birds at the nest until after 1030. When I got to the river I attempted to get in to the hide without any disturbance . This almost worked but I immediately saw a Dipper slide out of the nest and quietly slip away downstream. It had probably seen me but I can't be sure. It was 20 minutes before either bird returned which makes me think that was the case. Both birds arrived together, first they flew to the rocks in the water below the nest and then one, probably the female flew up to the nest. They were noisy enough to herald their arrival and I heard them coming even before they had landed. After a very short while, twenty seconds or so, the male joined her in the nest and I heard the new greeting sound that I had heard yesterday for the first time. Strange that you can see a bird hundreds of times and then hear something totally new. I will make an attempt to record this sound which is very interesting. At first both birds went to and fro from the nest in turn but after a while it seemed that the male missed his turn. He visited less and less until he stopped building and started to feed. The male had been collecting sphagnum moss from the high dry bank sides, he then flew to the rocks near to me and made more than a casual effort to wet the moss before flying back to the nest. At one point, instead of flying over to the nest side of the river, he entered the water with a full beak of wet moss and swam back instead. The nest is already taking shape and looks more circular than yesterday. With the male upstream, feeding and the female away from the nest gathering moss, I left as quickly as I could without any disturbance.
I returned at 5 for the last hour of light. I am trying to discover if the birds have any association close to the nest at this time of the day. At around the same time, the male arrived opposite the nest and sang a short song before he moved to a near perch to repeat his song, then after a while returned in the opposite direction and repeated the process. The presence of the male on two consecutive evenings at the same time and acting in the same way, is hardly scientific but perhaps indicates that the male was patrolling his territory before he went to roost. I am starting to gain an understanding of patterns of behaviour during the day. It seems that first thing in the morning they feed for the first few hours and then afterwards spend a couple of hours nest building. Then for the rest of the day they are off feeding again until dusk.