Dungeness Great White Egret

Picked up the Jim's this morning and we headed down the M20 to Dungeness arriving around 8.30am
On arrival we split up with the Jim's heading for the bird observatory area whilst I headed up to the beach.

The weather was mild with white cloud, no wind and reasonably warm for October.
I scanned the sea with the new scope to find Gannets feeding at distance, a Little Gull over the patch, a pair of Red Throated Diver and a Guillemot drifting along. Great Crested Grebe numbers are building on the sea as we get into autumn and thousands of Starling were on the moved heading west.
Hirundines were coming together for a final feed waiting for the right time and weather to head out to sea and their journey to wintering grounds.

Around the Lighthouse gardens I find several Goldcrest and a female Black Redstart.

Moving on to the catch up with the Jim's I arrive at the moat around the bird observatory and head towards the netting area. After a few minutes I find a female Ring Ouzel. I ring Jimmy and he makes his way over to connect with it. We also connect with a couple of Firecrest here and many more Goldcrests.
Chiffchaff are well represented here along with lot's of Blackbird.
(I here later of reports of Pallas's and YB warbler but we didn't see them)

We take a walk around the desert but little else is seen so we head back to the observatory to watch the guys ringing a few birds including a nice Jay, Blue Tits and Chiffchaffs.

Tried to grab a picture of the Glauc 

After a while we make our way to the car and take the short drive back to the fishing boat area where we quickly find the 3rd winter Glaucous Gull and it's joined as we watch by a Yellow Legged Gull.
I tried to record it via my IPhone but failed miserably.

Next we find a nice Stonechat before making our way to ARC pit where we find lot's of Golden Plover and Lapwings before I pick out a Little Stint on the far bank.
Also here are Pintail and Goldeneye.

The drive to the reserve follows and we connect with Tree Sparrow and Marsh Harrier on the way.
Once in the first hide we quickly find one of the three reported Great White Egrets and manage a few shots with Jimmy's camera. (Nice bit of kit he's invested in)
I hear Bearded Tits here and Cetti's Warbler.

Great White Egret

Close up, check out the green!

Satisfied with a good days birding and a nice test for the scope we head home.
Year ticks are getting harder and harder to find even in this month of expected arrival.