Last few days

Sunday 20th February

The drake Merganser again by the lockgates at the western end of Southwick Canal this morning together with a 2cy Shag hugging the far bank where the ships are moored. No sign of the Long-tailed Duck (despite Bridget having seen it yesterday), just the Great Crested Grebe from Friday by the Local Fuels depot and 4 Greenfinches. Seemingly nothing passing at sea.





Friday 18th February

With Storm Eunice having passed through earlier and the winds having eased a bit, we ventured down to Southwick Canal in the afternoon where a smart drake Red-breasted Merganser and a Great Crested Grebe were both new in. No sign however of the Long-tailed Duck.


Wednesday 16th February

Having been given the thumbs up by Worthing hospital on Monday and told that I wouldn't need to return for another 3 months, we decided to celebrate our wedding anniversary with an afternoon visit to Arundel WWT. Despite the blustery conditions we saw some good birds including prolonged views of a Water Rail out in the open by the entrance to Scrape hide, 16 Lapwing, 3 Marsh Harriers (2 distantly towards Burpham and another over the reserve), a Red Kite and a Grey Wagtail. The highlight however was a superb Jack Snipe from Lapwing hide which we knew nothing of until Gareth phoned us to say that it had just come up on Birdguides. One of those rare occasions when we happened to be in right place (5 mins walk away) at the right time. Photo courtesy of wwt.org.uk A pair of Mandarins in the ditch that runs alongside Mill Road. 



Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Morocco

Image
In early May, Bridget and I visited Morocco for the third time using the services of the excellent Gayuin Birding Tours  http://gayuin.com  Most of the photographs in the blogpost that follows are mine except for a few of the better ones taken on 8th May by Hamid Birdwatching  https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100010514010519 Tuesday 3rd  May Our half full EasyJet flight from Gatwick North Terminal departed bang on time at 06:25, arriving just over 3 hours later at a cloudy Marrakech. Immigration was the usual protracted affair (how long does it take to scrutinise a passport?) but surprisingly there was no checking of our Covid paperwork and seemingly no need for the ‘mandatory’ PCR tests we’d had done less than 48 hours before. Having reclaimed our baggage and changed some money into local currency (£1 = 11.7 Dirham), we headed out of the arrival hall where the familiar face of Hamid was there to meet us and our first Moroccan birds ( Kestrel ,  Pallid Swift  and  Spotless Starl
Read more

Early Spider Orchids

Image
Saturday 23rd April 2022 seems to be a bumper year for Early Spider Orchid with reports on social media of thousands of spikes on the Purbeck Coast in Dorset. Today we made our annual pilgrimage to Castle Hill NNR, near Brighton, one of the few Sussex sites for this species, where we were treated to the fabulous sight of hundreds of plants in the short downland turf on the west facing slope in the valley bottom. I was also hoping to find Early Gentian , another rare Sussex plant known from only a handful of locations, but despite a lengthy search we drew a blank. In the blustery conditions, birds were at a premium though a Yellow Wagtail and a  Swallow passed overhead and at least 3 Lesser Whitethroats were heard singing. Also seen were a Kestrel , 2 Stock Doves , 5 Yellowhammers , a Corn Bunting and my first Wall Brown of the year. We then went to Mill Hill, sheltered from the north-easterly blast, where several Dingy Skippers  at the bottom of the slope were new for the year, a L
Read more

Little Bittern

Image
The Brown Booby found exhausted on Hove Beach on 2nd January took me back almost 34 years to one of the more improbable and memorable experiences of my birding lifetime. It's a tale that's been told before but hopefully people won't mind if I tell again, especially as it took place no more than a mile to the west of where the Booby was found.  On 30th March 1988 I was driving eastwards along the A259 and had stopped at the traffic lights by Hove Lagoon. Something caught my eye and to my utter amazement there in the gutter on the side of the road next to where I had stopped was what I recognised immediately as a male Little Bittern ! Once the traffic lights had changed, I drove on a bit, pulled up on the side of the road (there was less traffic then) and ran back, grabbing the bird before it could fall victim to a passing car. In the absence of anything to put it in, I sat it on the back seat of the car where it quickly adopted an erect alarm-posture. From Hove Lagoon to De
Read more