Water Rail .
Ok i know its not a picture of the delightful Spotted Crake as the title picture but unfortunately although i had super views of this delightful Crake i never managed to get a photo , i made my way to the " Feast hide " at Grove Ferry arriving about 10ish expecting a long wait but i no sooner entered the hide and it was on view , i only managed very brief views of it disappearing into the darkness of the reed bed and yes ok i knew it was the Spotted Crake but i wanted much better views so decided with all confidence to wait it out until it gave itself up in all its glory.
There was plenty of other birds to keep me occupied which included 2 Green Sandpipers zipping about in a game of chase , 1 Common Tern flew in briefly then flew out again , 3 Black-Tailed Godwits put in an appearance in fine summer plumage then another Green Sandpiper taking the total up to 3 joined the other 2 then decided twos company and threes a crowd and flew off again .
Green sandpiper .
There where several very showy Water Rails , i counted 4 at one time but there probably were up to 7 of these fine birds , after about an hour or so a Greenshank dropped in for abit of a rest and there was a brief appearance of a Common Snipe .
So after about 3 hours sitting in this hide hoping to gain a better view of the Crake i was beginning to wonder if it had decided to stay under cover of the reeds out of the rain and out of sight , then two birders joined are party and with in minutes the Spotted Crake was located by one of the new birders and flew right out into the open giving stunning views , it climbed up and along a broken piece of reed showing of its fine white spotting , grayish head and yellowish bill were easily seen , it was very active climbing and moving in and out of reeds and dare i say it i still have a 100 % record on not dipping any Crake i have ever gone for , phew .
From here i had a brief stroll around to the water meadows but did not add anything new although i did see another 4 Green Sandpipers and with the weather closing in i thought i would make my way back to the viewing ramp in before i got soaked , i arrived and thought i had a Wood Sandpiper before it quickly darted into cover on the left hand side of the pool , damn why do they do that ??
Anyhow i scanned the pool and connected with 2 Ruff , a juv and a moulting adult a further 3 more Green Sandpipers taking the days total up to 10 , there were plenty of Lapwings.
I then was joined by two birders who i met in the hide earlier and the wader i thought might have been the Wood Sandpiper was confirmed as it was re located by one of the birders and and we were all enjoying really good views , sadly i never managed a photo as the rain was coming down and with this i decided to go to Sandwich and check out the site where the Temmincks Stint was reported about two hours earlier .
Temmincks Stint.
Restharrow scrape was my destination in pursuit of this fine Temmincks Stint , i arrived on site about 3.30 pm and there was not another birder in sight which is quite unusual for this site but what the hell , i made my way to the hide thinking it must of gone (hence no birders) and after my first initial scan i thought that was the case, 2 more Green Sandpipers, 1 juv Little Ringed Plover and several Lapwings were easily seen then something caught my eye on a smallish island in the middle of the scrape.
Yes it was the Temmincks Stint its been such a long time since i had seen one of these , they are really neat waders and a very much welcome site and year tick , it flew closer right in front of the hide , i couldn't believe my luck and reeled of several photos . Here are some of them.
Temminck's Stint
Common Sandpiper
Another birder joined me as i was about to leave so i put him onto the Temmincks and then headed of home very happy .
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