February 8-14th: London and Kent

The first three days of this week were local with two visits to Brent Reservoir and one to Fryent Country Park. Fryent is an interesting place to visit, sandwiched between Wembley Park and Kingsbury in northwest London. It’s mostly grassy fields with ancient hedgerows with some good wooded areas. There are a lot of ponds, mostly small ones with very little bird life but on this visit I actually found a first for the site: a drake Teal. Normally they’re shy birds and will fly off as soon as you come near them but this one stayed put, trying to look inconspicuous.

Teal

View from Fryent looking towards Wembley Stadium

I followed my local days with two days either side of the Thames, firstly at Crossness for third time this year. Funnily enough, I actually got a year tick on my way to the bus stop with a Blackcap singing along the river Brent – spring must be on its way!

At Crossness, a Buzzard flew low over the paddocks and I spent some time looking through the ducks on the reserve before going up to the river wall. The tide was quite a way out so with a lot of mud exposed there were plenty of waders, including a new one for the year: Oystercatcher. These are generally absent in London during winter but return to the Thames-side marshes to breed in the spring and there had been a few other sightings during the week.

Oystercatcher with a tasty snack

The regular Common Sandpiper was still by the outflow as was the Little Egret who had now been joined by a friend. One of the egrets indulged in a bit of high-stepping when it would show off its yellow socks, like it was auditioning for the Ministry of Silly Walks. The Grey Heron was having none of this nonsense and carried on its own fishing technique by standing as still as possible.

Common Sandpiper

Little Egrets showing off their yellow socks

Grey Heron

Walking back home from the bus stop I saw a large raptor circling slowly overhead which turned out to be a Red Kite. They are most often seen flying over here in spring but winter sightings are starting to pick up as the population increases in northwest London.

The next day was an early start so I could get down to Rainham for dawn. It was a glorious day with bright blue skies and hardly a breath of wind although that did mean walking straight into the low sun to start with. It felt quite spring like with many birds singing, especially Dunnocks which seemed to be in every patch of bramble. Other than that there was little change in birdlife to my last few visits with the flock of five Barnacle Geese and Spoonbill still present.

To round the week off I ventured outside of London for the first time this year. I met up with John & Janet at Victoria station and we took the first train down to Sittingbourne in Kent. We boarded the shuttle train on the adjacent platform but before we were due to depart the driver announced there was a problem with the rail and there was a team on site looking at it. Ten minutes later the train pulled out with no further updates so I can only assume they used a dollop of blu-tac to fix it.

We got off at the desolate Swale station and crossed over to the footpath that runs around Chetney Marsh. It was another bright sunny day but unlike yesterday it was windy which made it feel a lot colder. 

Chetney Marsh

We took our time, scanning the marshes one side and the River Swale the other side with its muddy edges full of waders. Buzzards flew overhead, at one point there were five over us, mewing away and one pair even talon-locked and tumbled downwards at great speed. Brent Geese were around in several small flocks and we scanned the large flock of Greylags for anything more interesting but there was nothing on this occasion.

Brent Geese

Buzzards

As we left the river wall and headed across the promontory, several coveys of Red-legged Partridges zipped past. We had lunch by the farm and had a look at Funton Creek before heading back. Amongst the hordes of waders we found some Knot and Grey Plovers. A single House Sparrow was heard by the farm – when we first started coming here there was a huge flock as well as other birds like Corn Buntings but they’ve all vanished.

Several flocks of Golden Plover flew over the fields but it was hard to see anything else new as the wind had gotten quite strong by now so we spent most of the return leg just walking. I stopped and went through the waders a few times and added Turnstone to the day list before we got back to the station and waited for the hourly shuttle to take us back. At Sittingbourne, the first train to London was cancelled and the cafe was already closed so we just had to wait for the next one. As we sat on the platform a Sparrowhawk flew past and snatched a Sparrow from the industrial estate opposite us.

I finished the week with a couple more visits to Brent Res, seeing the usual roosting Tawny Owl and making a start on cutting some willows down in North Marsh that have grown up in the reed bed.