Tuesday 12 January 2016

Lee Valley: Back on my old patch

Not so many years ago Lee Valley particularly the Fisher's Green area used to be my "local patch". It's hard to believe it's been almost 8 months since my last visit!
Today I made a brief visit hoping to add a couple of year ticks to my list. Arriving around 8.30am I headed for the Bittern hide hoping a Bittern would show itself. A Ring-necked Parakeet visited the feeders right outside the hide windows and a Water Rail walked across the channel, but there was no sight of any Bitterns. Back at the car park there were good numbers of Redwings feeding among the leaf litter .
After driving down to the car park at the bottom of Fisher's Green Lane I headed for Hall Marsh Scrape and added a Common Snipe to the year list. While scanning Friday Lake for any sign of Goosander two redhead Smew flew across the lake and settled on the water.






Returning to Hall Marsh Scrape we viewed the scrape from the hide. A Mistle Thrush feeding on the grass became my third addition to the year list, but very little else was seen from here.

Having still not seen any Goosander, we dropped in at Connaught Water before returning home. Brian had seen a pair here on Sunday. A short time after leaving the car park a male Goosander is found swimming between two of the islands. 

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