Despite the low pressure system that came through, and the building wind, some goods were still delivered today in the shape of the 3 Tundra Bean Geese reappearing, this time on Lytchett Fields. Looking at bill and feather patterns it looks to be the same 3 from Upton CP, but the quaetion is, have they been around since the early New Year, but just hiding in a local field somewhere, or are they now passing back through en route to somewhere else? This is a first record for Lytchett Bay and a welcome return for many year listers that missed them on Jan 1st before they then disappeared.
We also hosted a low-tide cruise today which (despite the wind) produced good numbers of birds out across the mud, however open water species remain ‘scarce’ with only 1 Great Northern Diver logged, along with 3 Black-necked Grebe and only 5 Great Crested Grebe! Red-breasted Merganser were still well represented with c80 seen along with 2 Scaup and c15 Goldeneye. The Black Brant was seen round the back of Green Island along with c800 Brent Geese in total. Wildfowl numbers seemed reasonably high with Wigeon, Teal and Pintail all in good numbers along the tideline of the southern shores and in the Wareham Channel 10 Spoonbill were feeding, 2 Marsh Harrier were active and wader totals consisted of c400 Lapwing, c300 Black-tailed Godwit, 26 Grey Plover, c300 Dunlin and c80 Great Cormorant. In Middlebere on the high tide c500 Avocet were roosting.
Eurasian Spoonbill – Wareham Channel – Seb Haggart
Black Brant (central) – Southern Shore – Garry Hayman
Tundra Bean Geese – Lytchett Fields – Ian Ballam
Although you couldn’t see further than 100m for much of the day, there were birds to be found…
Find out moreSo cold! Mid-week was delightful with even a hint of spring warmth, but today was proper chilly. Cold…
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