Whilst sitting in the hide at Fishers Green yesterday news came through that a Killdeer had been found at Ripley farm reservoir in Hampshire. I contemplated going yesterday but the weather was awful and I didn't fancy the drive back in the rain so I put in hold seeing that the rain was forecast to be in all night and that just might keep the bird there.
I set off with Dad and Jimmy at 5.45 am and arrived in the layby at 8am to find one free space. The walk out to the reservoir was almost a mile but we made light work of it and on arrival found about fifty people had beaten us there but the news was positive and we quickly had the Killdeer in our scopes for our first new bird of 2026. There were a few Lapwing present and some Wigeon on the water. A Little Gull was reported in the large group of Black-headed Gull after we left.
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| Killdeer twitch |
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| Scoping the bird on the far bank |
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| On the bank above the Mallards (honest) |
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| A further crop to help with the record shot |
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| Just behind the left hand Shelduck |
With the target achieved we headed off through the New Forest to see if we could find the Great tailed Grackle in Holbury some 22 miles away. As we pulled into the road the bird favours we found it from the car sitting on a garden fence so we parked up and enjoyed half an hour with the bird showing ridiculously well and calling from various higher posts. The bird isn't accepted as a true wild vagrant to the UK so isn't "tickable". It's thought that as the bird doesn't migrate it's likely it hitched a ride on a ship to get here and wouldn't get here naturally of it's own accord. I'm pleased we took the time to see it though whilst only 22 miles from it.
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| Great-tailed Grackle |
A lovely morning down in Hampshire with Dad and Jim
Life list now 453
Year list now 135 ( plus the Grackle 😉)
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