I did manage 30 minutes before dark Thursday at Lea Farm GP, 260+ Wigeon, 11+ Snipe, but not much else in the very frozen conditions. It has felt like a long week not being able to get down and it is hard for me to believe there hasn't been something exciting to see....a Pintail, a Dunlin? I guess we'll never know.
So this morning, the weather had finally broken properly, 7 degrees, but despite a thaw the ice has been so thick much of Lea Farm GP was still covered, albeit with thin ice.
Still enough open water to possibly pull something in, the same 250+ Wigeon, fewer Snipe visible at least. Over 2 hours Buzzard, Red Kite, Kestrel, Sparrowhawk, then a Peregrine which gave impressive display of swooping at the Black-headed Gulls both in the air and at one on the lake itself, forcing it to dive under...you don't see them do that everyday.
It landed in the Ashes behind the North spit, then out again quickly moving to the big Alder in the NW corner, where I got these shots, the first you can barely see it poking out above the branch.
2 Little Egret were about, about 15 big gulls landed for a while, one carried a blue darvic type ring baring the characters JEE3, at least I think the first character was 'J'. I'll be emailing the North Thames Gull ringing group if they know this ring.
Not a lot else and I was at my car when John, called us back at Teal hide, after he had left us and gone to check it, a Bittern was on show for just 1 minute.
A look for 45 minutes at 15:00 was fruitless too.
What was obvious was the state of the reeds, clearly the Bittern has been stomping about here for days and it would seem no one has been here to see and report it.
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