Brian's birding blog: Patch birding

Sunday, 30 August 2026

Patch birding

So It's official I have rather unexpectedly become a patch birder. The chosen "patch" if the King George V reservoir at Chingford and its only a ten minute drive away which suits me at the moment. I bird it early (really early) so I can get home to help Suzanne with her breakfast etc. I've always liked birding at first light anyway so it's no hardship. The George has been a favoured destination for spring and autumn passage over the last couple of decades but I've never really worked it that hard. The recent introduction to Ebird has helped too as I'm enjoying counting ducks which I never saw coming. I've also enjoyed the company of the like minded fools that call the KGV their patch in particular Henry who's put himself out to meet me their on several occasions to work the circuit with me. He's a lot younger than me so his eyes and ears work so much better than my own and with these tools he's added a few birds to our day lists that I would have otherwise missed but I've found a few for him too so swings and roundabouts.

Anyway rather than post after post about the patch I've decided to just drop a blog post update once a month on my patch birding results but I'll continue to blog days out or twitched birds too of course just to maintain the diary format.

So to August.........

I saw 104 of the 109 species reported missing just Coal Tit, Rook, Mistle Thrush, Arctic Tern (which we're not sure was actually seen) and of course the two Long-tailed Skuas picked up flying north over the reservoir on 16th August.

The 104 includes the following highlights.......

Short-eared Owl seen on 14th by me and Jimmy was an early bird and quite the surprise

A Whimbrel on 4th was the only one for the site this month and I don't think anybody else got to see this one.

Oystercatcher was another bird most if not all failed to connect with this month but I had the family of four that bred locally on 1st August and another single bird on 17th.

I had three Great White Egrets drop in and land in the relief channel on 1st August and at least two hung around for the locals to enjoy too.

Others waders on the 1st included Redshank and Lapwing and of course the constant Common Sandpipers that blessed the site all month. Goosander were present with first two red heads and then a third before they departed on 18th. Shoveler started arriving on 1st and built to a high of 128 by the month end. Teal arrived slower and I had a peak count of just 15 whilst Pochard again were present all month but in small numbers. The Tufted Ducks continued to build and peaked at around 1500 although Henry did a click count of 2812 on one occasion. Coots are constant at around 500-600.

I had a Turnstone on 2nd August which several locals twitched and we then had another flock of four a flock of five and lastly a flock of seven before the month ended. The star wader this month was the juvenile Ruff that spent a few days from 22nd August through to 28th and was enjoyed by all the local patch listers. We also enjoyed Ringed plover and Little Ringed Plover this month and I found a Green Sandpiper on the causeway too. Henry picked up a couple of Curlew flying south on 25th whilst I was with him and we also had a couple of Greenshank spend half a day on the causeway along with a couple of Black-tailed Godwits and a few Dunlin to make it a month in which I saw 13 wader species.

I picked up a Black Redstart on 17th along with three Whinchat and several Wheatear throughout the month but we failed to find anything more exciting like the hoped for Redstart or Flycatcher.

We had two juvenile Black-necked Grebes arrive on 15th before they made their way to Walthamstow reservoir. They returned for a day on 23rd too.

I found my seventh Med Gull of the year and another Yellow-legged Gull on 22nd.

The local (Eleven) Barnacle Geese started flying over the reservoir on 22nd and are quite predictable using the same route at a similar time each day now.

The 27th saw me find an eclipse drake Pintail which just a couple of the locals managed to get there to see before it departed that evening and on the 29th Neville found the returning drake Scaup and I managed to get to him to enjoy that too.

so my months total was 104 and the years total sits now at 126 with me needing just 4 to achieve my soft target of 130 that I set for myself.

The local Ravens continued to entertain me and have been my highlight this year for sure.

In terms of other birding.....there is none at the moment but watch this space as I'll try to find time for a day out or two in September if I can.