Saturday 16 June 2012

Black-winged stilt and little bittern

I've given up traditional twitching in favour of foreign trips but I have added 3 British ticks to my list in as many weeks. The first was the marsh warbler at Rainham. No photo I'm afraid as it only showed for a few seconds at a time while it flitted from bush to bush!

While at Chichester a couple of weeks ago I went to see the black-winged stilts at Pennington Marshes as it wasn't too far away. I hadn't been there before but I found it by chance on the first attempt. It was a drab and dreary morning but the stilts were on a pond only a couple of hundred metres from where I parked. There seemed to be an adult and a juvenile.  Here they are:
Black-winged stilt.
Blackk-winged stilt with a redshank.
Today, I decided to go for the little bittern which has been at Rickmansworth all week. I picked Alex up near his house and we headed round the M25 to the Aquadrome LNR. Unfortunately, we took the long way round, not knowing where the bird was. Eventually we got there and the little bittern was keeping a very low profile out of the wind! The sun went in and it started to rain. After about half an hour, the bittern came out of hiding and skulked behind some vegetation. Then it came right into the open for about 30 seconds enabling me take a few photos and a short video before it disappeared back into the undergrowth.

Little bittern, Rickmansworth.

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