Pete Lambert Wrote yesterday:

Tuesday 29 November 2011 and very blustery, so most of birds out of sight.  But at 9.10am I arrived at the Chalk Bridge (crossing the Lee Navigation at the north end of the Marshes) where as usual I checked the gulls sitting on the roof just NE of the Bridge, at the Bus Garage.  Most mornings there are a group of Black-headed Gulls standing here, although sometimes one or two Common Gulls join them.  Today though, the most right hand bird was a Mediterranean Gull!  Looked like a full adult, although I couldn’t see the tips of the primaries clearly enough to be sure it wasn’t a 2nd winter bird.  The only other record I have of Mediterranean gull was in 1996 when another adult flew along the west edge of the Lockwood Res and on north over the East Marsh.  This also made my 100th bird for the year seen at the Marshes.  Photos attached are rather indistinct, but you can see the thick bill of the bird (the last one on the right), and the extensive black “shawl” behind the eye.  Through the bins the primaries appeared all white (2nd winter birds show variable amounts of black in the wing tip).

Apart from that, Kingfisher at Pymmes Brook from bridge to Northumberland Park, Jackdaw SW over Stonebridge Lock calling, 2 Teal in west channel at East marsh, Goldcrests calling at Stonebridge Wood and Chiffchaff calling at East Marsh.

Pete

Click on Pic to enlarge
 

Pete Lambert wrote yesterday:

 Saw a female Bullfinch at East Marsh this morning (24 Nov 2011) which together with hearing one call in three places last week and seeing two males earlier in the month leads me to think there may be three Bullfinch wintering on the Marshes – always difficult to see though.  Saw Water Rail just north of Green Bridge as well as two Little Grebes there, which together with the four Little Grebes on the Navigation itself made a total of six.  22 Fieldfare up from Stonebridge Wood and then off West calling.  Kingfisher on the concrete at Pymmes Brook at Clendish marsh and one (a second?) on the concrete edge of channel north of East Bridge late.  Only one calling Chiffchaff, although there may be more south of Clendish Marsh, a favourite habitat for them and a part of the Marshes that I only visit on survey days.  Last Friday Terry and I saw a Snipe feeding in the channel north of the East Bridge, my first Snipe on the Marshes this year.


DMC

[Note: Click on an image to enlarge it. Click again to zoom in further. See blog entry for Dec 2010 to see the named areas on aerial maps.]

A glorious day for the Bird Survey given we were in the third week of October – starting out with frost on the ground and developing into a cloudless blue sky with a warm sun (warm enough for dragonflies).

Our Egyptian geese were outside the Waterside Centre to greet us (I’m always disappointed if they are not!) and our three groups set off to the three survey areas.

In the West area, we saw some of our arriving winter thrushes – a large flock of Fieldfares flew over and some Redwings were also spotted going over. We searched for Stonechat hoping we might get some overwintering with us this year but none were found.

However, we did find two Reed Buntings, one male and one female.

At the very end I heard a Buzzard call twice but couldn’t see it. A Buzzard was seen at nearby Walthamstow Reservoirs that morning so there was definitely one in the area.

Chamara Sugathsiri carried his camera on the survey and kindly provided these photos from the morning.

Debbie