Slimebridge produces the good's!!!!!!!!!!

27/08/10

(YEAR TICKS- GREEN

LIFE TICKS - RED)

I had no idea what toexpect as i hadent had or seen any news on slimbridge for about a week, but the day dawned bright and set to be a good, we coencided our arrival with high tide, but all the waders were just out of sight on the saltmarsh, nevertheless, we ticked flying DUNLIN and RINGED PLOVER, CURLEW and multiple COMMON GULL, a juv WHEATEAR was flying about the flash in front of the hide and a few YELLOW WAGTAILS were flitting back and forth among the grazeing cattle, among the numerous gulls and lapwings.
Then over to the south lake..............

Although one of the best places on the site for views i hate here for the simple reason of joe public who randomly stroll into the hide, run around, make general noise, then leave.

But there was a few nice birds....

I imidiatly got onto the flock of Godwits and started scanning through, and once again 3 BAR TAILED GODWIT stood there, in a flock of 68 BLACK TAILED GODWIT, a single REDSHANK and 4 GREEN SANDPIPER, a bit of deeper searching got me one of my Highlights a Stunning adult winter SPOTTED REDSHANK hiding behind a godwit, can you spot it in the picture?????

after about an hour admiring the spotshank and godwits we eventually had enough of the public and retired to the most horid hide in the world................

' THE ZEISS HIDE ' dun dun dunnnnnnnn.

Well i really do hate this hide the most out of all the hide's at slimbridge ( followed by holden tower- then south lake etc), but it does have some bloody good birds.

It was nice to drop directly onto a GREENSHANK, which then promptly dissapeared. then i found the 2 RUFF ( an AD male and juv fem), but then i scanned and there was another, then another, then another, and another, and another and another, A total of 8 RUFF!!!!!!!!

8 bloody RUFF, 8 of em, UNBELIEVABLE........

another 30c BLACK TAILED GODWIT were amongst the teal and shoveler, a wisp of 4 SNIPE flew over, another 2 REDSHANK and 2 GREEN SANDPIPER were all in one scopefull with the flock of ruff's ( 2 ad male, rest fem/ juv) and a few LAPWING, check it out (well trust me those species are in that pic)

SO, now it was over to the middle point hide................ (our 2nd visit after 1 at high tide), and a very soggy trudge through the reeds ( was badly flooded) and in trainers :-/

but this was easilly the BEST part of the day;

along the path there we noted a massive 80c YELLOW WAGTAIL feeding in the surrounding fields, a pair of HOBBY gave great views as they swooped on the wagtails and martins, and a PEREGRINE flew over

a massive 2 hour stint was spent scanning from here, as the tide was out and it had amazing results:

after an hour the waders started to flock at a managble scopeing distance and i had about 900 small waders to be dealing with here, so alot of the numbers are estimates, the waders were passing close to the hide from their high tide roost to their low tide feeding point, and latched onto a flock of RINGED PLOVER was a CURLEW SANPIPER !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! and just a few more !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

and this was quickly followed by another bird and again in a ringie flock 2 CURLEW SANDPIPERS, result............

3 WHIMBREL were feeding on the mudflats, including one which was quite close and never stopped calling,

right back to small waders, there was lots!!!!!!!!

400c RINGED PLOVER

400C DUNLIN

160+ CURLEW (here alone)

a good grilling of the waders gave me a pair of LITTLE STINT, which looked so much smaller than i remembered ( the one in turkey in april was so close, and was only next to a kentish plover :-D, only next to a kentish plover lol), 8 KNOT ( all juv), 40c SANDERLING and 20c dark TURNSTONES (although one was sum-plum), this gave me a stunning 18 wader species for the day!!!!!!!!!

You gotta say, that is a kickass day, was it worth the £9.50, i think so.

a very nice day

HIGHLIGHTS:

150c SHELDUCK

1 LITTLE EGRET

2 HOBBY

1 PEREGRINE

400c RINGED PLOVER

400c DUNLIN

8 KNOT

40c SANDERLING

20c TURNSTONE

2 CURLEW SANDPIPER

2 LITTLE STINT

6 GREEN SANDPIPER

3 REDSHANK

1 SPOTTED REDSHANK

1 GREENSHANK

100+ BLACK TAILED GODWIT

3 BAR-TAILED GODWIT

200C CURLEW

3 WHIMBREL

4 SNIPE

8 RUFF

8 COMMON GULL

10 GBBG

80c YELLOW WAGTAIL

1 WHEATEAR.

a total of 81 species for the site day.

MB