Parakeets at Knole

Weekend family stroll at Knole Park to see the deer found 6 Ring-necked Parakeets around their normal nesting area, otherwise it was fairly devoid of birds. Plenty of deer though.

Winter Wonderland

An early morning drive down to Dungeness saw -10C registering on the car thermometer.
First stop was Northpoint GPs where the small patch of unfrozen water was largely occupied by Mute Swans and a few wildfowl but a lone Barnacle Goose was also picked out.

At the Dungeness RSPB Reserve, Burrow's Pit had huge numbers of wildfowl in unfrozen patches with 30+ Pintail and a Goldeneye.

The New Excavations sported a showy Slavonian Grebe which caught a frog and swallowed it whole, 2 female Red-crested Pochards and 4 Little Grebes.

The Christmas Dell Hide turned up Black-necked Grebe and a redhead Smew and the nature trail around to Hooker's Pit yielded a Water Rail swimming in an unfrozen ditch and a superb Woodcock flushed up and did 3 circuits around our heads as the sunshine came out.

New Diggings had 2 areas of unfrozen and amongst the wildfowl were 4 Goosanders, several Smew (incl a drake), several Goldeneye and a lone Ruddy Duck.Other highlights were 3 Stonechats, 3 Marsh Harriers, 2 Foxes (one walking around on the ice) and 20+ Little Grebe from Dengemarsh Hide.

The Swan herd at Lydd revealed one Whooper Swan amongst 40+ Bewick's whilst at Scotney GPs a drake Red-crested Pochard and 6 Scaup were found on the Kent side.

On the way home at Jurys Gap the tide was in, sea was calm and we picked out at least one distant Red-throated Diver.

Leaving the area at 1pm the temperature had crept up to -0.5C which felt positively balmy.

Wierton Waxwings

The six Waxwings were soon located in the small orchard at Wierton Hill feeding on apples amongst the large numbers of Fieldfares, Blackbirds and a couple of Redwings. These Scandanavian winter visitors were my first for 4 years and with patience I got some satisfying pictures in the afternoon sunshine as they fed in the orchard and sat in the trees. When disturbed they would raise their crests before flying with a pleasant trilling call.

Waxwings

New Year's Day at Bough Beech

Got the year off to a start with a trip to Bough Beech Reservoir and was pleased to connect with the female Bearded Tit which had been present from 5th Nov last year. I managed to get some pictures of this smart individual which represented my 128th species for the reservoir.

Bearded Tit (female)

On the feeders I saw one each of Brambling, Marsh Tit and Coal Tit and on the reservoir itself 6 Goosanders, a Ruddy Duck (only my 2nd ever at this site) and a pair of Mandarins checked in but the reported Great Northern Diver failed to show.

Goosanders

Brambling

Mallard on Ice