07/09/2020 Arundel WWT and Pagham Harbour

 Friday 7 August 2020

Arundel WWT

Sara and I braved the sweltering heat to go round the WWT centre at Arundel. We were very impressed with the way they were operating in this Covid 19 era; the one-way system worked well, the limits on numbers in the hides were adhered to generally and the eating/toilet facilities were excellent.

We were quite lucky with the birding too:-

• There was a distant cattle egret on one of the islands on the main lake as well as the more common little egrets.
• As always, this is a good place to see sand martins.  We saw dozens flying overhead.
• It was nice to see some reed warblers from the hides.  Several sedge warblers flitted about in the reeds as we moved along the paths.
• Bird of the day for me however was a captive bird.  Several black-necked grebes, in wonderful summer plumage, swam within 1 metre of us, enabling us to enjoy superb views.

courtesy of Richard Steel

 

courtesy of Stephen Govan and Flicker

• We had a couple of sightings of kingfisher, the last one being a close view of one perched on the bare branches of a tree in the water.

A very pleasant couple of hours, rounded off with a superb vegan pasty from the canteen.

 Church Norton and Pagham Harbour

As we had some time to spare, we decided to visit Pagham Harbour, just before high tide.  Alas, there were no car parking spaces at all at Church Norton so we parked at the RSPB Visitor Centre and walked to the Ferry Hide - my first chance to see this new facility.  

The hide was closed but we did some birding from the balcony and the adjacent banking area:-

• The usual suspects were showing well, including black-tailed godwits, black-headed gulls, lapwings, and a greenshank. 

Can't beat birding in the company of your daughter - thanks Sara!