Lesser Yellowlegs twitch!

Another dull and dreary winters day at Dungeness, but still plenty of birds to look at starting at the fishing boats 08.10-10.25:

Brent Goose: 38 up

Shelduck: 3 down

Common Scoter: 7 down

Red-breasted Merganser: 4 down

Red-throated Diver: 63 down       17 up

Cormorant: 812 down between 08.10-08.30

Gannet: n/c      c25 off shore

Turnstone: 8 on beach

Great Skua: 1 down

Pomarine Skua: 1 up

Kittiwake: n/c c 25 off shore

Auks:  c40 on sea

As I drove across the causeway 2 Great White Egrets could be seen on the New Diggings. A walk around the Willow Trail found several squealing Water Rail, 4+ Chiffchaff and 3 Goldcrest, in the Long-tailed Tit flock.

Walking from the ARC car park to Springfield Bridge and back saw the usual Tree Sparrows and Reed Buntings round the feeders at Boulderwall. In the fields north of the entrance track c 100 Golden Plover, 20 Curlew, 200+ Lapwing, 200+ Greylag and Canada Geese, 2 Marsh Harriers a Common Buzzard and another Great White Egret. Dengemarsh and the Hayfields were fairly quiet, but did attract 3 Little Egrets and look for spring waders.

A short watch from the garden at lunchtime saw of note the 2 Cattle Egrets, 2 Great White Egrets, a grey Heron, 3 Marsh Harriers, a Common Buzzard and a Sparrowhawk.   

Lesser Yellowlegs at Pett.

This afternoon with news that the Lesser Yellowlegs was showing well at Pett level I made my way there in the company of MH and CP. On arrival at Pett the it was indeed showing very well right beside the road, where it remained until a a ballon came over the sea wall and spooked everything, also of note there a nice flock of 26 Ruff.
Late afternoon back at the ARC from Hanson we had an excellent finish to the day, a Kingfisher was doing what Kingfishers do outside the hide, 2 Redshanks were swimming in the centre of the lake, 2 Bitterns flew across the lake as did 4 Great White Egrets and 4 Little Egrets, 2 Marsh Harriers were terrorising the Coots, 2 Goldeneye were on the lake, 100s each of Jackdaw, Carrion Crow and Lapwing flew through to roost as did many Starlings, the finale was a Large female Peregrine dashing through. An excellent day despite the gloomy weather.