Tring Reservoirs - 29.12.15

Scaup

 

With just a couple of days left of the year I decided to head over the patch in the hope of a last minute addition. I started off at Wilstone where I met up with my old birding mate Jonathan Nasir (@Randombirder) (see his blog link below) who I hadn't seen for many many years since he moved to East London. Together we walked round and reminisced about the old days and what we had seen over the years. In between chatting we noted a female Red-Crested Pochard on the Drayton bank and a pair of Goldeneye from the jetty. Also seen were Red Kite, Skylark, 3 Yellowhammer and a Reed Bunting.

Bittern

 

Next stop was Startops where fairly quickly we found the 1st winter male Scaup. We then had a couple of hours looking over the reeds on Marsworth in the hope I could finally add Bittern to the year list. Water Rails called along with a Cetti's Warbler. A Kingfisher sat in view for a while but the usual time that the Bitterns had shown in the previous few days came and went and unfortunately Jonathan had to head off. Another hour passed before Dave Bilcock managed to pick out a Bittern in the furthest reed bed in near darkness. My final addition to the patchwork challenge. I finished the year on 123 species and 146 points which saw me finish 6th in the Inland South section which isn't too shabby!