Friday 18 October 2013

A Dull, Glossy Morning


As forecast, there was a thick fog covering East Kent this morning so, instead of spending fruitless hours on the Ramp looking into murk I drove to Stodmarsh and planted myself in the Reedbed hide at 7.00am. As soon as I sat down a Kingfisher flew in, landed on a fishing post and then promptly left. Then I noticed the Glossy Ibis on the opposite bank alongside a Little Egret and a Grey Heron, this probably being the bird I first saw on Tuesday. It took until well after 9.00am for the fog to lift and even then it was mostly cloudy with the very occasional glimmer of sunlight and the Glossy Ibis always new this a when the light was murky it’d be fairly close and as soon as it walked away the sun shone!!! The little bugger must have known. I stayed in the hide until 3.00pm and was joined by Steve Ashton mid-morning with others filling the hide throughout the morning and afternoon. Not much birding done today but there were 197 Teal on the pool early on plus we also noted 1 Cetti’s Warbler, 1 Water rail, 3 Great-crested Grebes, 50 Greylag Geese, 1 Green Sandpiper and 1 Greenshank.
Glossy Ibis and Little Egret in the fog this morning
 
Little Egret on the Kingfisher fishing Post
 
|Reflections of a Little Egret on the Kingfisher fishing Post
 
Great-crested Grebe offering itself to the camera
 
Great-crested Grebe offering itself to the camera

Glossy Ibis when a little bit of Sun showed

Glossy Ibis still in gloom

Angel Wings

High ISO, just think if it had been Sunny???

High ISO, just think if it had been Sunny???

Little Egret below the hide window


Short Phonescoped video