Finally a Bittern at Fisher's Green!

Saturday morning was spent at home, mainly due to the weather forecast predicting very strong winds mixed with even more rain showers. Having got completely drenched in a rain storm last Saturday while scanning the gulls at Rainham Marshes I wasn't overly keen on a second soaking.

Saturday afternoon and a break in the clouds, Brian rings and says he's going to Fisher's for a couple of hours.

Twenty minutes later and we are parked up in the farm car park and heading for Longlands Hide. 

The feeders having been stocked with food produced the usual species, Great and Blue Tits, Dunnocks and Chaffinches. A brief photo opportunity before we move on towards the farms.

With the winds growing ever more powerful it wasn't surprising that most birds were tucked well in among the denser cover.

The surrounding fields held big flocks of Canada and Greylag Geese but only a couple of Egyptian Geese were seen among them.

We made the return trip and headed for the Bittern Hide.

Having already made several trips since the new year without a Bittern sighting from here I wasn't overly confident of spotting one.

On a clam day you can sometimes hear the Bittern moving within the reeds, but this was not going to happen today. After several scans Brian says he has the back of a Bittern in his bins.

I join him and after several attempts to locate the bird, it decides to move and I get a sighting.

Shortly afterwards it emerges into the central channel and slowly moves across into the left hand reeds.

Bittern (Photo B.Anderson)

Another bonus was a Water Rail out in the open feeding among the shorter reeds.