Tuesday 1 January 2013

Great Start to New Year at Dungeness .

17 Waxwings at Tescos.

I started off my New Years birding at Tescos and was treated with 17 Waxwings to get my list of to a good start , i then headed of to Dungeness adding more common species as i went , i called into Wallend Marsh and had distant views of 10+ Bewicks Swans and yet another Waxwing . From here i went to Dungeness rspb reserve to get info on whats around , after checking the board i went and checked out Burrows pit from outside the hide and was soon onto 2 Redhead Smew which were amongst good numbers of the more regular ducks , whilst watching the Smew i was joined by another birder and pointed them out to him , then 3 Great White Egrets flew up together and then landed nearby and were soon joined by another bird making 4 in total , i then noticed a distant Egret flying towards us and i was amazed to see it was yet another Great White Egret making 5 in total , this bird also landed and i have managed a record shot of all 5 birds together .

5 Great White Egrets together .

I let the information centre know and another birder said he had seen 2 from the entrance track , which were obviously the same birds however it came out on the pager as 7 birds , i only ever saw 5 birds at anyone time and believe that to be the true number. I was really happy with this sighting and is the most i have seen together in the UK and beats my previous record of 2 at the same site last year.

3rd Winter Glaucous Gull.

From here i headed off to the fishing boats but had time to check out the feeders by the entrance track and was delighted to see at least 15 Tree Sparrows , i arrived near the fishing boats and scanned through the Gulls but could not pick out the prize i was after , i ventured further down and soon come across the stunning looking white winged wonder 3rd winter Glaucous Gull .

What a beauty.

I enjoyed this bird for half an hour and then went to have a look out at sea and was pleased to see several Divers going by , mainly Red Throated but i had one close in Black Throated , there were plenty of Guillemots and Great Crested Grebes on the sea plus several Kittiwake were flying up and down the coast , my last destination of the day was Denge Marsh road , where i had distant views of a female Red Crested Pochard which would have shown well from the hide , plus there were 2 Marsh Harriers and a single Common Buzzard over head , and that more or less rounds up my day finishing on 60 species for the day .