Wednesday 22 February 2012

Wednesday 22nd. February 2012

They said it would be 'Springlike' today , but no one told the weather . With rain due after lunch , and the warmer ? weather , I decided to try once more for my first Brambling of the Winter , and headed for Bough Beech Reservoir , a Kent Wildlife Trust site . I did not succeed in my quest , and found very little , due mainly to a very strong wind blowing down the reservoir , making it look like the North Sea . So this post will take the picture and comment form .
From the new hide overlooking the Roy Coles Scrape , a Lapwing was meticulously preparing a hollow on one of the small islands , while it's mate stayed on the other island .
A male Kestrel flew over with something in it's talons . A bad shot as it was about to move on having seen me , showed that the 'something' looked very much like one of the many Blue Tits around .
This male GSWoodpecker stayed just long enough for one shot before he too departed .
It was good to see , and hear , a good number of House Sparrows , fingers crossed , they seem to be on their way back .
One of the local Robins was wrestling with it's breakfast , but it downed it in the end .
Watch out little fellah , that Kestrel could be looking for seconds .
The only wader seen today , was this Common Snipe , probing the edge of the small North Lake .
Further up the bank , this Pied Wagtail was definitely struggling to find any insects in that wind .
A picture of concentration as one of at least a dozen Grey Heron seen , tries , and got , it's meal .
On the reservoir , lots of Teal , a few Wigeon and Pochard and at least 40 Cormorant .
On the way home , a Rook in the horse paddock on the bottom lane posed , for once .
And finally , I mentioned yesterday that I thought there might be 3 youngsters in the Grey Heron nest . When I processed some of the other shots taken , just one showed a third bill , behind the adult's legs .

6 comments:

Phil said...

Triplets it is then Greenie. Nice one.
I'm recovering from a very serious bout of man flu at the moment but hope to get out tomorrow if the weather is as nice as promised!

Lancs and Lakes Outback Adventure Wildlife Safaris said...

Hi Greenie, our Herons haven't even laid yet!

cheers

Davo

Warren Baker said...

that was one grey old afternoon Greenie, warmer tomorrow ?

Like that Snipe shot :-)

ShySongbird said...

Plenty of nice photos Greenie and I loved the last one!

I haven't seen any Bramblings in my garden this Winter but at least the snow brought the Fieldfares in.

Heavy rain and high winds all day here!

Marc Heath said...

Nice shots, nice to see the Herons are doing well.

Alan Pavey said...

Some lovely pics Greenie, shame about the lack of Brambling, they have been particularly scarce down here this winter.