TWO DAYS AT SLIMBRIDGE.
I am a member of The Wetlands Wildlife Trust and I choose to support them. It pays me back by allowing me to see great wildlife, often very close up.
On a sunny Monday morning with a cold wind keeping the temperatures down to a low of three I started to enjoy myself. A short walk to the South Lake Discovery Hide took us to where we saw:
Avocet
Black-headed Gulls in large numbers
Eighteen Black-tailed Godwits
Cormorants
Goldeneye
Great-crested Grebes
Grey Heron
Lapwing
Oystercatchers
Redshank
Shellduck
Shovelers
Teal
Tufted Duck
Wigeon
Herring Gull
(Also a juvenile gull that I have yet to identify)
And when we returned in the late afternoon a Sparrow Hawk spooked the water birds and flew twice past the hide. In the hides leading to the Holden Tower, on the other side of the reserve, there were some great close up views of Pintail that were looking very elegant. These observation points provided views over the open grassland where we saw several varieties of geese:
Barnacle
Brent
Canada
Greylag
Pink-footed
White-fronted. (The Greenland were still there but too difficult to pick out. Maybe next time.)
Cranes (a single, a pair and three flew by and all giving good views)
And a Peregrine Falcon was see flying over the edge of the estuary.
A Buzzard had been seen too and two Lesser-backed Gulls were in competition with two Crows over a duck carcass. Also I saw Rooks and Jackdaws were everywhere.
At a feeding point there were
Blackbird
Blue Tits
Great Tits
Long tailed Tits
Chaffinches
Dunnocks
Robin
House Sparrows
Collared Doves
Wood Pigeons
Coot
Moorhen
In the pond close to the reception centre there were a variety of ducks, a multitudinous quantity of Mute Swans and four Bewicks that I think are resident. All of the wild ones together with the Hoopers had all flown during last week. Also many other species had gone towards their breeding grounds. I think an early winter visit would be much better.
This morning we walked to the far hides - the furthest being Kingfisher Hide - and saw nothing exceptional. However there was a very busy Rookery with about 45 nests and evidence of nest building. Amongst the Oaks a Greater Spotted Woodpecker was heard and then flew. Robins were very evident and fearless and so good to see close up.
Our new birds here were Wren, Dunlin and one Pied Wagtail with hundreds of Wigeon grazing nearby.
Herring Gulls added another one to the list and that was it for this trip and a total 43.
I have not mentioned anything that I had seen when walking through the enclosures where there were the non-indigenous birds. Another day, warmer weather and with more time to spend these enclosures would be very worthwhile, but I do prefer to see my birds in their wild state.
All sightings can be seen on their web site.
