Sturt Pond Bird Hide to Keyhaven Observatory
We met at Sturt Pond Bird hide where Chris Barrass joined us , as Keith Metcalf was unable to lead the walk due to illness. We were delighted to see our first good spot of the morning – 3 snipe prodding in the grass around the scrape.
We walked along towards the crabbing bridge, spotting a heron, lapwing, cormorants, black headed and herring gulls. Soon we saw the turnstones in their usual place along the stream, busily looking for food. Then we saw swans -both black and white! There were 8 mute swans including three juveniles and seven black swans. It looked as though the mute swans had the upper hand, making themselves look as large as possible, the black swans looked quite small in comparison.
The road beyond the bridge was flooded so we walked along the bank taking in an oyster catcher, stonechat and a fly past and landing of hundreds of brent geese on the field to the left . On the salt marsh to our right we had a close up of several dunlin sitting on one of the few visible rocks, and a little further on 5 mergansers and a great crested grebe. On the remainder of the walk we saw and heard redshanks, bar tailed godwits and curlews.
We were greeted at the observatory by Chris again, and were all entertained by a cormorant trying to swallow a flat fish! Little grebes, many coots and gadwall were on the pans, but few waders as the water level is so high after all the rainfall and the leaking tidal flap. Of the 10 of us who started some had peeled off, but those who stayed were rewarded with the majestic sight of 2 Marsh Harriers and a Kingfisher.
We may have missed some birds that Keith would have pointed out, but we thoroughly enjoyed our walk and the birds we identified. Get well soon Keith!
A full list of birds identified is in the table below.
| Snipe | Bar Tailed Godwit | Black Headed Gull |
| Herring Gull | Lesser Black Backed Gull | Little Grebe |
| Cormorant | Grey Heron | Lapwing |
| Pied Wagtail | Meadow Pipit | Mallard |
| Mute Swan | Black Swan | Brent Geese |
| Little Egret | Redshank | Curlew |
| Oyster Catcher | Stonechat | Robin |
| Blackbird | Carrion Crow | Gadwall |
| Coot | Kingfisher | Marsh Harrier |