NEW HYTHE THURSDAY 20TH JANUARY 2011

I left the car park to the accompaniment of a Cetti's Warbler this morning, it wasn't the full bodied cabernet sauvignon type call that they are famous for, more of a light beaujolais version, but welcome nevertheless.

There was a cold northerly blowing as I made my way round a quiet Brooklands lake, no sign of the Goldeneyes today, I didn't see one at all, but I understand the drake is back on the Alders trout lake. The river was low and the tide was still falling, although there was a lot of water running into the small creek, this is overflow water from Brooklands lake and the sunken marsh. We've had a lot of rain! Just the usual birds on the river, but nice to see three Shelducks, one of which is pictured above, from the woods and a sparrowhawk flying over, I didn't linger long there in the teeth of the breeze but continued round the deserted sunken marsh. Two flocks of Lapwings each amounting to about 25 birds flew downstream in quick succession, a good count all told.

I spotted the bittern, pictured above (just), in the northeast corner of a very flooded Abbey Mead lake. It's up at least a foot I reckon and a lot of the path around it is under water now. This made it difficult to see properly but there didn't seem to be anything out of the ordinary to report, although happily, I did see a Kingfisher along the northern edge, my first at New Hythe since 9th December, which brings my New Hythe January/year list to 64.

Streamside lake is still home to the Red-head Smew (above) it's very nervous and I couldn't get near enough for a better shot. The Goosander was also seen there this morning but I couldn't find it myself. But I did find my second Bittern of the morning in the 'usual' reedbed pictured below. Great shot isn't it? If you can't see it too well try looking at it through binoculars, or alternatively left click it!

I returned along the river past the Heronry where the Herons are doing what they do at this time of year, building nests, noisily. There were twelve to fifteen birds in the trees, on and around their bulky platform.

There was a lot of shouting and arguing going on and as the pictures below show, sometimes the neighbours just got too close for comfort and territories and boundaries were open to dispute.

Note the legs in the top of this picture!

DUNGENESS GLOSSY IBIS TUESDAY 11th JAN

Because the weather forecast is rubbish for the rest of the week I decided to get a quick visit to Dungeness in today. As I drove up the entrance track I noticed a couple of people in cars parked opposite the pools on the right. It turned out they were trying to find a Glossy Ibis of all things that had been spotted yesterday. We eventually found the bird in a poolside reedbed and had good but distant views for about two minutes before it suddenly decided to fly off towards the ARC pit. I had my camera with me but still in it's case and by the time i'd got it out and switched it on the Ibis was disappearing fast. I did manage to fire a couple of quick distant shots of very dubious quality, but at least it shows the salient points, downcurved beak, trailing legs etc.

While searching for the Ibis I spotted a Bittern flying past, the first of three seen today. I noticed the second one (below) standing on the edge of a reedbed on the far bank of the lake just outside the entrance to Scott hide. There were four people in the hide, who came out to have a look and one of them turned out to be Bo Beolens of Kent Birders forum and inventor of the 'Fatbirder Top 1000 Birding Websites' counter. Very nice to meet you Bo! The third Bittern seen flew across the front of Christmas Dell hide and landed in the reeds to the right.

Just opposite Christmas hide is a clump of tangled undergrowth and it was here that I found a Goldcrest and immediately afterwards a Firecrest. I stood there for ages in the biting wind waiting for an opportunity to record the sighting and eventually got my chance when it emerged again for about a couple of seconds, just long enough for the record shot below. This is only my third sighting of these little birds, I hope i've got the ID right!

Other species seen today included about half a dozen Marsh Harriers across the site and a Kestrel opposite Boulderwall Farm. A Black-necked Grebe and Red-head Smew, seen from the comfort of the visitor centre. A Goosander which flew in front of Makepeace hide and landed in front of Scott hide. At least six Pintails and a couple of Cetti's Warblers. Oh, nearly forget, about a hundred thousand Wigeon, well a couple of thousand probably, but it seemed like a lot more!

In all 44 species, it probably would have been more if i'd had time to visit the ARC site. But all things considered I think Dungeness RSPB came up trumps again.

NEW HYTHE MONDAY 10TH JANUARY

Brooklands lake was 50% or more covered with a thin layer of ice again this morning. The southern half was clear though and it was here that I saw the first two of four Goldeneyes seen today at New Hythe lakes.

I decided to walk along the path on the northern edge of Abbey Mead lake, adjacent to the water filled ditch which carries excess water from the Railway lake. This eventually empties into Abbey Mead where the path becomes a dead end, but affords quite good views of the unfrozen eastern edge of the lake. At last, in this narrow stretch of ice free water, I finally located the Red-head Smew that has eluded me for a while now, this is a new bird for the year and brings my total for New Hythe so far to 59 species. While I stood watching the distant Smew a Bittern came gliding lazily past me from the hidden northeast corner and crashed down in typically ungainly fashion into the reedbeds opposite. Not a bad start to the morning I thought!
At the start of the railway path my attention was drawn to the sound of quite loud, creaking and pinging noises coming from the corner of the lake. It turned out to be the action of the ripples moving the sheet of thin ice where it meets the open water, pictured below. I stood alongside listening for a couple of minutes, the wind was very light, there was no other sound and I found it quite eerie listening to the usually so quiet water.

A loose flock of maybe 30 Lapwings flew over the sunken marsh area, with one or two dropping down to feed by the river and a distant Sparrowhawk, the only raptor seen today circled downstream.

All in all I would say it was generally very quiet today, it was more about quality than quantity, even though I did see 41 species in all. As I walked back to the car park with Dennnis and Doreen who I bumped into over in the country park, the quality continued when I spotted another Bittern (below) standing in the reeds in the northeast corner of Brooklands. This is right in the shadow and drowned by the noise of, the ghastly paper mill. Obviously, unlike me, the birds don't seem to mind it.







On reaching the car park we detoured a short way up the Millstream to look for a Water Rail but only found the two semi resident Teal and a couple of Moorhens. My last port of call was to Alders small lake aka the Trout lake where I was told the female/immature, had been joined by a male. My heart sunk as I arrived to find a couple of fishermen in situ but I soon located the pair at the far end of the lake and managed to get a couple of distant shots of them.

The first of the two pictures below show the male looking up at a gull as it passed low over it's head. And in the second one, appearing to lift his legs up and splash water at it, in an apparent attempt to tell it to sod off and leave him alone. Never seen that before! Mind you the gulls often do torment the life out of them as they surface with food.

Lastly, I was pleased and amazed on Saturday morning when a flock of between 20 and 30 Siskins landed in the Laurel tree in my garden. In previous years i've only ever noticed maybe two sightings of single Siskins in the garden. This is a really good year for them it seems.

NEW HYTHE MONDAY 20TH DECEMBER

There was a Cetti's Warbler flying quite openly between the reeds and brambles this morning as I made my way along the western edge of Brooklands lake. You wouldn't normally expect to see them like that but these are desperate times if you are a 'little brown job' and perhaps even more desperate if you rely on open water to feed, like Ducks, Kingfishers, Grebes and Herons. At the moment there isn't any open stillwater at New Hythe lakes as the picture of Brooklands lake above shows. There were about twenty Coots strung out in a line making their way to the centre of the lake to avoid a couple of big black dogs bounding around the edge. The person in the left of the picture is Alan Woodcock, I saw his car in the car park earlier. I hope he had as good a walk as I did today.

Abbey Mead is also 99% frozen with just a small twenty foot by twenty foot patch of open water (below) containing dozens of birds including Mallards,Shovelers,Gt Crested Grebes, Tufties and Coots. Thankfully this piece of unfrozen water is on the eastern side of the lake which is pretty inaccessible so at least they don't get disturbed. Except that is by the odd fox (above) who chanced his luck on the ice this morning. While I watched, a Kingfisher landed in the small tree next to me and then he headed for the tree next to the open water, fat chance of finding fish there though I fear.

It was a similar story on the Railway lake, it too has only a very small piece of unfrozen water to offer the few remaining Coots. As I stood by the lake I had one of half a dozen sightings of a Sparrowhawk, this one chased a Redwing into the lakeside bushes alongside me but flew away empty handed this time. The other sighting here was a flyover Skylark and a Mistle Thrush, both new species for the December NH list. I continued on to have a look at Streamside lake and maybe find a Redpoll in the Alder trees there but i didn't find one. Maybe it was something to do with the shouting lady with the five barking dogs, or maybe i'm just getting cynical. Either way I stayed until the noise had faded into the distance and then retraced my footsteps to cross back over the railway line. But as I passed the south west corner of Railway lake again a Bittern flew up from the first fisherman's swim there, right next to the wide, often busy path that skirts the East scrub. I managed to quickly get a poor rear view shot as he flew off towards Streamside. That's the first Bittern i've ever seen on this lake and where it flew up from is solid ice, another desperate situation I think.

There were a lot of Redwings along this path and a few more Fieldfares than usual but they are still extremely shy and the picture below is the best I could do, but even that is better than I normally get.

Then came the next surprise, another Bittern, I've seen more at New Hythe so far this winter than I've seen in my lifetime. This one was also on the Railway lake, standing on the ice under the Willows on the Eastern edge. It was almost out in the open and was visible from the main path just before the railway crossing. There was no chance of finding food there because as the picture below shows it is solid ice.

Maybe that's why he decided to leave and try somewhere else, although goodness knows where. I wondered if they might visit the reeedbeds alongside the river but I somehow doubt it as I think they prefer fresh water and the river here is brackish being tidal. The in flight efforts below are a bit blurry but I've left them in to show some plumage and wing shape which isn't often seen.

With the river path still probably blocked and a high tide spilling over into the adjacent ditches I decided to walk down the wide path where a large flock of mainly Long tailed Tits were feeding in the Oaks alongside and another Sparrowhawk made a failed attempt to find food. At the end of this path I planned to join up with the sunken marsh path but before I did I walked along to the small bridge by the river and there, to my surprise was a female Goldeneye, the first i've ever seen on the river. I took a couple of pictures and was about to go when a small Grebe flew past me heading north along the river, it was either a Slavonian or a Black necked Grebe, I can't be sure which but I lean towards Slavonian purely from the shape of the black crown. I wondered if it had come down in the area of the creek further downstream by the small wood. So that's where I headed next.

On the way I spotted this handsome Fox, just as he spotted me, he was a superb looking specimen with a really red coat and a fine tail, he certainly seems to be survivng the weather OK. Perhaps he's one of the three that have been visiting my garden lately and eating the chicken I leave out for them.

It's been quite a long story today so I'll cut it short and say that I didn't find the Slavonian Grebe, but I did find a Water Rail in the creek and saw four Snipe and a Grey Wagtail over the river as well as two Reed Buntings which are another addition to the December list bringing the total to 65 species. Coincidentally a certain person did predict a figure of 65 for this month, you know who you are Warren! I'll obviously try my best to reach 66 now.

Finally, here's a picture of a Teal on the river who has found a good way to conserve precious energy.

BITTERN BONANZA MONDAY 13TH DECEMBER

I was lucky enough to bump into Alan Woodcock down at New Hythe today. Until then my visit had been fairly uneventful really, but that soon changed. Alan had just spotted a Bittern in the reeds on Abbey Mead, it was well hidden but I managed to get a sight of it after a bit of searching. As I watched it I noticed a fairly large bird fly into a reed bed a bit further along the lake. This turned out to be a second Bittern which we were both delighted about, two Bittern within about 100 yards of each other on our local patch. How good is that, especially after my encounter with one last week. To get a slightly better view and a record shot we walked around the side of the lake and crossed a small stream which gave us a view straight across to the reeds where the second bird could be seen a bit more clearly. But not very clearly as the picture below shows! Left clicking it will help. After a bit of a chat we went our separate ways feeling pretty pleased with ourselves, Alan crossing the stream and retracing his steps and me following the little used footpath to return to the car park. But there was more excitement to come for me. I had only walked fifty or sixty yards when to my astonishment I found a third Bittern! It was right next to me in the reeds not fifteen feet away. It had obviously seen me and was relying on it's camouflage to stay hidden instead of flying off in panic as a Heron had done further back along the path. This was by far the best view i've had of a Bittern and luckily I had the camera out and was able to take a few pictures before, unfortunately the bird decided that discretion was the better part of valour and made it's exit. So, three Bitterns in about twenty minutes, it doesn't get much better than that, especially in your own back yard so to speak, and who knows how many more there are on the site at the moment. Other birds seen before the trio of Bitterns included a Green Sandpiper which flew over the edge of Brooklands towards the river giving it's distinctive call. A couple of Lapwings along the edge of the river and a probable Redshank which flew up in the distance. Four Bullfinches in various places along the river. Two Kingfishers, one on Abbey Mead and one at the top end of Streamside, which is still frozen solid. A couple of Siskin in the Alder trees adjacent to Streamside. A Sparrowhawk that cruised silently along the stream at the southern edge of the East scrub, and three Goldcrests around the edges of Abbey Mead lake.

Finally, I couldn't help noticing how quiet the sunken marsh seemed today, I hardly saw anything in the area apart from much reduced numbers of Redwings. Could the picture below, taken just inside the marsh along the footpath have anything to do with it??

BITTERN AT NEW HYTHE THURSDAY 9TH DECEMBER

I've waited a long time to get some half decent New Hythe Bittern shots and today I got my chance. I stood at the southern end of Abbey Mead lake and counted nine Grey Herons basking in the sun on the distant north edge of the lake. I wondered if maybe the Bittern would also be attracted to this area and a closer scan proved me right when I spotted this one in the NE corner.

This is a pretty inaccessible area but I managed to get close enough to fire a few rounds off while literally lying on the leaves and snow to keep myself out of sight of this extremely shy and elusive bird.

I must have watched it for a good thirty to thirty five minutes during which time it hardly moved, for the most part it kept to the sky watching pose which is so associated with the Bittern. It almost looked as if it was watching the planes and other birds fly over.

As you can see above it was twice visited by small parties of ducks and on two occasions a Heron flew in close by where it was standing on the reeds. But each time a visitor arrived the Bittern took absolutely no notice, giving the impression that it was too busy to look and was also way above such goings on, aloof almost.

By the time i'd finished I was cold and stiff after staying still for so long, much of the time having to shoot with one hand while I held back the undergrowth with the other, but I was really pleased to have seen the bird and got the shots. I was also pleased that I hadn't disturbed it, it was unaware of my presence and I left it exactly as I'd found it.

I managed to add five new species to the New Hythe December list as well this morning. Pied Wagtail, Collared Dove, Sparrowhawk, Kestrel and Canada Goose. This brings the total species so far to 60. It's going well so far!

New Hythe 1st March

Frustratingly I only had a couple of hours this morning but I managed to make the most of them though. The first thing I noticed after parking the car was that there was a new "lake" adjacent to Brooklands car park. This has been caused by the Millstream bursting it's bank and overflowing into the sunken area next to the railway line. I've never seen this happen before so that's a measure of the amount of rain that's fallen recently.


I caught up with Alan Roman alongside the mound and as we turned left along the Northern edge of Abbey Mead lake I noticed a dark shape among the reeds at the waters edge, a quick look through my bins confirmed it as a Bittern, as you can see in the pictures below it was grasping a clump of reeds about halfway up the stems and pointing it's beak skywards in classic Bittern pose.

The river was the colour of strong tea and was running downstream fast although the tide should have been coming in, I think maybe this had something to do with the amount of floodwater the river was carrying. Not much to see here but as we stood in the warm sunshine this Swan paid us a visit, so naturally I had to take it's photograph, they are just so photogenic.

There were actually a pair of Mallards swimming on the East Scrub (flood) today, it's looking more like a wader scrape every day now. There was at least one, possibly two Kingfishers calling loudly in the corner of Streamside as we passed by but I was unable to see them, no sign of the Bittern there either but I suppose two in one day is a lot to ask for at New Hythe, although by no means out of the question.

FEMALE TUFTED DUCK

I had to get back for an appointment so I left Alan and walked down the flooded Millstream to get back to the car park but just before I did I found a Chiffchaff in a small tree by the lakeside, not great views but that was the third Chiffchaff sighting I had heard about around the site that morning which was good to hear.

MALE TUFTED DUCK

Just before the end of the Millstream there's an overhanging tree and the lower branches touch the water and catch all the twigs and rubbish that gets washed downstream, this has formed a sort of raft and on it was this little chap. First one i've seen for a long time! I couldn't decide which picture to use so I used them both. You can't have too many Water Voles can you?

Bittern by the bug.

Streamside Lake

I met up with Ken from Halling at about 14.30 this afternoon and we had a very pleasant couple of hours around the western side of New Hythe lakes i.e. the Lunsford Lane side of the railway line. The objective was to try and catch up with the streamside bittern again, it becomes a bit of an addiction after a while.

We started off along the towpath between the Alders lakes, there were a lot of birds on the big lake but we couldn't see anything out of the ordinary, one or two jays were noted before arriving at the windsurfing lake which held it's usual assortment of coot, grt crested grebe, tufties, swans etc etc. Then through the west scrub where a small flock of fieldfare were feeding in the hawthorns and then onto the east scrub where we had a quick look at the floating platform in the ditch which has been placed there to monitor the possible presence of mink , which were reported to the rangers a couple of times through the year and which would obviously pose a threat to the water vole population on the site. I believe the platform holds a small bed of clay which is checked periodically ( I hope) to see if the mink have left evidence of their presence by leaving their footprints on it, at least I think that's the idea. The rest of the east scrub was pretty quiet apart from a couple more fieldfares and a few redwings, there was however a few pied wagtails over which were all heading to roost towards the trading estate at the bottom of New Hythe, we wondered if this would be where Alan Woodcock recently reported a large roost of these birds?

And so to streamside where we stood and scanned for bittern in the rapidly failing light. While here we had fly pasts of kingfisher, more pied wags all heading in the same direction as the previous birds and a water rail went past almost unnoticed in the margins where we stood and was heard calling a little later from the reedbed. The light had all but gone now and with no sight of the bittern it was nearly time to head back, but then it came, suddenly entering from stage right with a short flight to the middle of the reedbed where we could see it for a couple of minutes before exiting stage right again with another short flight...............mission accomplished!