Mystery bird

Lade - 0800hrs - cold, cloudy, rain, ne 4 - The wind direction had driven the large mixed flock of wildfowl and Coot on south pit close to the footpath but there was nothing unexpected in the massed ranks. A Marsh Harrier was hunting over the reedbed, while a flock of 200 Goldies wheeled over the airport fields.
New Romney - Every now and then I get an e-mail or phone call regarding a `mystery bird in the garden`. Most turn out to be regular garden birds some of which, such as this one, in aberrant plumage. The finder said it had been coming to food in the garden for a couple of years and it wasn't long before it `bounced` down onto the lawn, confirming my suspicion that it was indeed a Blackbird; an adult female with two white outer tail feathers and nothing in between! The bird could fly ok, but had trouble landing on a fence due to a lack of counter balance, as a result of which apparently it spends most of its time on the deck. Apologies for the poor pic, but an interesting bird nonetheless.

                                                             White-tailed Blackbird, New Romney


Dungeness - 1415hrs - A 30 minute seawatch from the concrete road with MH, in a brisk north-easterly, predictably delivered very little apart from a few Gannets, Kittiwakes, Common Scoters, 2 Red-throated divers and singles of Med Gull and Bonxie.