Not a lot

Just like last weekend I didn't have that much time for birding , so I stayed local and both weekends it was Rainham Marshes being my chosen site . Last weekend a 1st winter Caspian Gull and 2 Marsh Harrier were the highlights and this weekend the same female Marsh Harrier plus Peregrine, Curlew, Rock Pipits were noted. All seen at the West end of the reserve. Not setting the birding world a light I know, but nice to get out even if only for a couple hours! 

Female Marsh Harrier being chased by a Crow in very late afternoon light

Down at Dunge

I was back down at Dungeness on Saturday with Mick and Rich, with good light, the thought was to improve on the shots from the weekend before but one slight problem was the fact the gull numbers were down by 80%. So, as always with Dunge their is something to photograph and I made the most from this oiled Kittiwake which landed only for a couple of minutes on the beach. The week before there was loads of  Kitt's to photograph just not this week when the light was better. On the tide line were a few Turnstone and out on the sea were Guillemot and Red t Diver and not much else really, but on the Arc pit still was the Great White Egret which showed better in the afternoon than it did first thing in the morning.....

 

Get your Kitt on

Saturday morning Monkey, Martin Redfern and I headed down to Dungeness arriving at the Arc pits  first for about 8.40am and picked up the Great white Egret, 2 Smew, Marsh Harrier and some Goldeneye. We couldn't of asked for a better start to the day. So we moved on to the fishing boat area and I picked out a Balearic Shearwater going west straight away, and it turns out it was the same bird that Paulboy and Mo had who were standing east of the fishing boats also Mick and Rich had joined us to by then. With strong winds the tideline was littered with broken crab and shell fish which the Gulls and Kittiwake were feeding on and a single Little Gull too, by this time I was in ' Gull heaven'. I did miss a few bids going past due to being interested in the large amount of Gulls and taking shots of the Kittiwake in the poor light and rain. Myself Monkey and Martin did try for the Humes at the trapping area but had no joy with it being very windy etc, and if you do go, you do need to take wellies!. After getting soaked we decided to go home and had 2 GW Egrets on the Arc pits as we headed out.

 

All ISO 640 5.6