Hen Harrier

Mild, wet and windy - This past week (in between all the family stuff) I`ve managed to escape into the surrounding countryside for a wander around the lanes and farmland where standing water is everywhere; sewers and ditches are full to the brim following the recent rainfall with many fields either flooded or super-saturated. Further `tidying up ` of rough field corners and the grubbing out of old willows and hawthorn scrub, so vital for small passerines, continues apace, particularly down Church Lane which was the last place I saw Tree Sparrows locally a year ago. The star bird was yesterday, during a break in the weather, with a ringtail Hen Harrier quartering the arable land across Romney Salts towards the airfield, but otherwise it was a case of Buzzards perched atop lookouts or hovering Kestrels. Small birds were few and far between with the odd Stonechat here and there, several Meadow Pipits, Goldfinches and Pied Wagtails on a dung heap, and stubble fields attracting a few Skylarks, Reed Buntings and Yellowhammers. Sewer margins have lured in a handful of Little Egrets, Grey Herons, Grey Wagtails and flushed Snipes, while a dead sheep along Hope Lane proved attractive to corvids and Magpies after a Buzzard had its fill.  

                                 Corvids on sheep, Hope Lane, NR

                          Grubbed up willows and hawthorns, Church Lane, NR

Further afield the wintering Bewick`s Swan flock of up to 50 birds, although mobile, is usually viewable from the back lane crossing Walland Marsh toward Brookland, while the Whooper Swan pair regularly visit the ARC lake. Tuesday evening we checked out Hookers reedbed on the reserve for roosting birds from Dengemarsh Road, where c500 Starlings came to roost along with three Marsh Harriers. Just before Christmas an Iceland and Glaucous Gull were noted along the beach at Dungeness and are hopefully still in the area, awaiting relocation for the New Years Day bird counts...