Friday 12 October 2012

Little Stints

Dungeness - 0845hrs - Cloudy, cool, showers, w4 - A change in wind direction failed to make much impression offshore with just the usual Gannets, Sandwich Terns and porpoises present. An hour and a bit at the fishing boats/concrete road also produced 2 Arctic Skuas, 2 Common Scoters, 5 Red-throated Divers, 4 auks and singles of Little Gull, Kittiwake and Dunlin down-Channel. Several hundred pulses of Swallows and House Martins coasted into the wind and there was a light overhead passage of Goldfinches, Siskins, Redpolls, Chaffinches and Skylarks. (PB & TG noted Black-throated Divers and Bonxies earlier).
The adult Yellow-legged Gull remained within a mixed flock of large gulls on the shingle.
ARC- A wander down to the pines in blustery, showery conditions unsurprisingly yielded little apart from more finches, larks and pipits overhead. The willows held a few Chiffchaffs and a Goldcrest, but the best passerine flock was in the scrub at the entrance to Tower Pits which was full of tits, Blackbirds, Robins and Chaffinches, a few more Chiffchaffs, a Blackcap, Reed Bunting and 23 Tree Sparrows (counted as they flew back to Boulderwall). From Screen hide all the usual dabbling ducks and a couple of hundred Swallows and House Martins over the water.
Dengemarsh -  A wander down the main track this afternoon from Boulderwall to the ramp delivered 4 Stonechats and a Whinchat by the Corral, Marsh Harrier and Raven over, plus the Great White Egret flying over Hookers.
Back over the road, a quick look from Hanson hide proved worthwhile with 2 Little Stints (definitely!!), 6 Dunlins, 222 Golden Plovers, 124 Lapwings and someone trying to string a Dunlin into a Curlew Sandpiper... Anyhow, the late afternoon sunshine on the Goldies was a real treat and at least 2 individuals showed some remnants of breeding plumage. Raptors this afternoon totalled, 4 Marsh Harriers, 3 Kestrels, 2 Sparrowhawks and a Buzzard.

                                         Waders & Wildfowl, ARC

1 comment: