Highland Cattle .
A very productive couple of hours spent at Oare Marshes this morning produced 2 new Oare Marshes patch ticks , i had a quick scan over the East Flood where i counted 10 Avocets , 40 + Dunlin and 5 Grey Plovers , there were the usual duck species , Pintail , Shoveler and Gadwall in small numbers , from here i headed off to the car park near the slipway and had a bitterly cold walk into the wind along the sea wall , to be honest i was so cold i didn't see anything and decided to carry on around to the new acquisition area which is further inland , and it didn't take me long to pick out my first Oare Marsh patch tick of the morning in the form of a Water Pipit which was amongst a flock of Meadow Pipits , i only saw this through my bins as by the time i set up my scope all the pipits took to the air and landed at the back of the flooded area amongst the Highland Cattle .
Two Coots on the new acquisition .
Sorry for the lack of photos it really was not the weather for photos , well that's my excuse anyway , i spent about half an hour scanning for the pipits but they were staying well hidden right at the back , i bumped into Murray Wright and he informed me that he had seen several Little Gulls on the Swale so i said my goodbyes and braved the very cold wind and headed back to the sea wall and scanned the Swale and sure enough i was soon onto 3 adult winter Little Gulls which were my second patch tick of the morning and very welcome indeed , many thanks Murray , i also added 2 Red Breasted Mergansers from here , i was frozen solid and decided to head back to the warmth of my car adding Common Buzzard flying over the Swale towards Sheppy plus there was a large gathering of waders near the slipway which included Redshank , Dunlin , Grey Plover and a single Curlew .
