Gary Howard's birds and wildlife

I picked Mike Buckland up just before 05.30 and drove down to Dungeness hoping that we might get something on a sea-watch despite the less than ideal forecast which had been for light westerly winds. As we drove across Romney March the temperature dropped to just 1*C, so much for Spring then!

We were sea-watching by 06.30 and that was about all we could do since very little flew or floated past- the wind was a light north-easterly! Our tally was meagre -a couple of distant Bonxies and small numbers of Common and Sandwich Tern's, a single Little Tern and a few Common Scoter. There was a steady trickle of Swallows

We gave it up soon after 08.00 and birded Denge Marsh down to the gully. We had over 20 Whitethroat, several Cuckoo's, c10 Wheatear and a female Whinchat.  Best of all we had several brief but good flight views of a Purple Heron which in the light of the RSPB's announcement that they are breeding is safe to mention now ! 

After a quick break for breakfast in New Romney we resumed our birding on the ranges where we had little new bar a couple of pair of Stonechats.  Back on Denge marsh we started to pick up the odd Hobby and a fair few Swifts and noticed that there was a column of birds over the ARC pits so we drove over to check it out.

 When we arrived 8 Hobby's were hawking low over the lakes adjacent to Boulderwall Farm in a strengthening breeze. After a few minutes they had mostly moved higher and further away. We walked the willow trail and heard a Garden Warbler and then went to the Hanson Hide where we watched a Spotted Flycatcher - sadly not a common sight anywhere in the U.K. these days.

It was after 2pm and we felt we'd pretty much exhausted what the peninsula had to offer and headed off onto Romney Marsh. In the Cheyne Court area we had a couple of Hobby's, several Marsh Harrier's, 10+ Yellow Wagtails and a few Corn Bunting. Where are all the turtle doves?

It was good to catch up with Pete Simpson in the morning - now a rare visitor to these shores.

Hobby