Garganey & Stone-curlew gives us a nice morning in the Brecks & Lakenheath.

Brian gave us an early call asking if we wanted to go to Cavenham for the Stone-Curlews.  

So a quick cup of tea and some toast and on our way around 6am.

The early start pays off when we arrive to find a fellow birder already has a few Stone-Curlew

and we are soon onto them and we spot 5 in all.

I need a Woodlark for a year tick but to my surprise, I never heard or saw any, Brian heard one while Jimmy and I walked about in the hope of getting a year tick, Jimmy already heard one a couple of weeks ago when I again missed it.

We see a few Wheatear and Stonechat plus 0ne Lesser Redpoll, a Red-legged Partridge, and a 

nice Red Kite along with Kestrel gets us off to a good start for the morning.

Off now to Lakenheath 20 minutes up the road.

We soon pick out 3 Garganey way over the back of the pool but they are well hidden by the reeds so a long way off, as we walk around the water opposite the east forest we spot 3 more to give us the most that we have seen in one go, 4 Drakes and 2 female.

Water Pipit had been seen yesterday here but we never found them.

4 Great Egrets along with a few Little Egrets are seen to round off the morning.

 Stone-Curlew

One of the 6 Garganeys seen.

 

Ring Ouzel + Wheatears & Sand Martins at KGV res

 A late afternoon trip over our local reservoir as we have heard of a Ring Ouzel over there.

It's only a short trip but the 20 miles per hour signs slows us down.

As soon as we arrive we find a few first-of-the-year Wheatears, then another year tick when 2 Sand Martins fly along the water then back again over our heads.

We meet up with a couple of birders that Brian knew and after a talk, we head off in different directions in the hope of finding the Ouzel.

About 20 minutes later we heard a loud shout that told us that the other two fellows had found the bird.

We shoot off back toward the yacht club and meet up with them and the Ring Ouzel is there

just by the fence, so another good year tick for all of us.

One of the other fellows tells us he needed the Ouzel for a lifer so nice to share that with him.

The Ring Ouzel

Again

Jack Snipe at Amwell nature reserve.

Brian came over to us so we could pop over to Walthamstow to renew our  KGV reservoir permit but after a phone call, we were told that their printer was not working and can we go over next week.

So we decided to head to Amwell as that is only 20 miles away and we don't have a lot of time.

The aim is to see the Jack Snipe that has been reported from James' hide. I did the driving to give Brian a break as he is doing a load of that at the moment with family ties.

After a quick look from the viewing platform where we see a single Snipe,

some Shoveler, Teal, and a Little Egret and Heron before we move onto the hide to look for the Jack Snipe.

We scan a channel of flat reeds and Jimmy finds the target at the back of a pool of water along with another Common Snipe, that is a good year tick for all of us. While here we get the first Chiffchaff of the year for us. We never saw the Bittern that is here but to be fair we never looked for it. As I said it is a short visit so we headed off for home after a couple of hours with 2 years ticks. Just nice to get out to see some birds as it is hard finding time when all 3 of us can go at the moment. 

Although we got some great views in the scope of the bobbing Jack Snipe it never came right out of the reeds for great photos.