Tuesday 6th February 2024 - Greylake/Ham Wall.

 

This week the 3 Amigos didn’t decide where to go until Tuesday morning and after discussing a few places we decided to visit the Somerset Levels as we had not been there for a few weeks, and we also knew that 2 rare ducks had been found at Greylake so that was going to be our fist port of call. I decided not to start a day list until we arrived and so the first sightings of the day were Mute Swans in a field behind the car park, also in the car park visiting the feeders were lots of House Sparrows plus a few Chaffinches. Walking towards the hides we had a very close encounter with a Wren allowing us to approach within a few feet, we also spotted Lapwing and Snipe as they flew over. In the bottom hide I was amazed at the sheer mass of birds mostly ducks the majority being Shoveler, Wigeon and Teal plus hundreds of Lapwing and Snipe. One of the birders in the hide asked if we were here to see the 2 rare ducks and told us we would get a better view from the top hide so we moved there and immediately found the Green Winged Teal right in front of the hide unfortunately asleep as it was for all our visit. 

Green Winged Teal (front bird with common teal behind)
Bath Birdwatcher.
A guy was sat with his scope and we asked if the Baikal Teal was showing and as he know where it was found it in his scope for us, a lifer for us all and the Green Winged Teal was a second time only. 

Baikal Teal (front bird unfortunately looking away)
Bath Birdwatcher

Baikal Teal (righthand bird sleeping) (Bath Birdwatcher)

So we managed to see both Teal in about 5 minutes and not the 2 hours it had taken others on previous visits. Returning to the bottom hide to allow other birders to see the 2 ducks I found 2 Greylag Geese then another birder alerted us to a male Marsh Harrier the first of many we were to see during the day. Next 2 Egyptian Geese flew in and a small group of Mallard were out to our right with a Great White Egret. Time to move on and back at the car park a flock of birds flew over that contained both Starlings and Fieldfares, Also a few Goldfinches were in a bush above our heads with Blue and Great Tits. Next stop was Ham Wall quite a drive so with eyes searching we added Lesser Black Back Gull, Jackdaw, Herring Gull, Collared Dove, Buzzard, Kestrel and Cormorant. At Ham Wall we had lunch in the car before setting off and spotted a flock of fly over Canada Geese. Lunch finished we set off towards the 1st viewing platform finding Reed Bunting, Redwing, and Robin before we reached the old railway line now a cycle path, walking along here we found Coot, Pochard, Gadwall and flyover Great Spotted Woodpecker, Woodpigeon and Grey Heron. At the viewing platform were Tufted Duck, Great Crested Grebe and Black Headed Gull. With the water level very high we realised were unlikely to find any extra water birds here so decided to head for Noah’s. Dunnock was our next new sighting and Bryan spotted a Siskin in an alder and on closed examination found 9, plus in the same area a Goldcrest and Bullfinch. Nothing new was found as we walked to Noah’s and in the hide amongst 1000’s of ducks were 100’s of Pintail I have never seen so many together in one place and the only time I have seen as many wildfowl was years ago at West Sedgemoor. Another rare duck a Ring Necked Duck was spotted by another couple of birders in the hide and while we scoped the general area they must have slipped out of the hide so we were unable to get better directions and were unable to find it. Time to set off back to the car and on the way a Little Egret flew over, the only one we saw on the day, Driving home we found Pheasant and Rook giving me 50 species on the day with 7 years ticks including the Baikal Teal  which was a lifer.

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