26/02/17 RSPB Rainham Marshes and Coalhouse Fort

Sunday 26 February 2017
East Grinstead RSPB Local Group

RSPB Rainham Marshes

An impressive 19 members made the trip up to Essex for our annual visit to this site.  The weather was kind to us with dry conditions all day, although it was windy and overcast.

No new birds to report but there was a good variety of species seen - 54 in total. 

• Pick of the bunch was the flock of 15+ Snipe which took to the air near the end of our trip.
• Pintails were showing well in good numbers.
• Marsh Harriers, Black-tailed Godwits and a couple of Common Gulls provided other highlights.

Coalhouse Fort

Mid-afternoon, 7 of us made the extra journey out to Coalhouse Fort to see the Avocets.  

• Unfortunately we were about 2 hours after the high tide and we had to walk a long way east to catch the main flock on the sands.  There were well over 3000 of them, spread over a large area - but nevertheless a most impressive sight.

• There were also huge numbers of Black-tailed Godwits and Dunlin around.

We were able to push our species count into the 60+ region.

Another lovely day out with my local group.