** Sunday 30th Jan. 1hour Garden Bird Watch: Saturday,29th Jan. IsleOf Sheppey.**

** First of all I have a question for my fellow bloggers who do photography. I use a Skylight B filter on the end of my 70-300mm lens. I also have a Cir Polarizing filter which I have yet to use. I was wondering which, if any do you use. **
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SUNDAY 30TH JANUARY 2011
RSPB 1 hour Garden Birdwatch, from 11.30am to 12.30pm.
Species seen:
Blackbird 1(m)
Starling 8
C/Dove 8
W/Pigeon 1
Blue Tit 6
Great Tit 1(f)
L/T/Tit 1
Robin 2
Dunnock 2
Chaffinch 7(m3,f4)
Greenfinch 2(m1,f1)
Goldfinch 1
Reed Bunting 2(m1,f1)
Grey Wagtail 1(f)
Pied Wagtail 1(m)
Blackcap 4 (m2,f2)
H/Sparrow 8(m3,f5)
Great Spotted Woodpecker 1(m)
Magpie 1
Most daysI have more Finches that that visiting the garden, it just shows how it varies from hour to hour. The highlight today, is it produce a record number of Blackcaps for the garden 4(2m2f). I have had 3 before but never 4.

Dunnock.



Male Blackcap.



Starling bathing but where's it's head??

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SATURDAY 29TH JANUARY 2011
I spent a few hours on the Isle of Sheppey on Saturday 29th January with my friend Ian. We started off at Minster Beach. It was a bit chilly to say the least, but at least it was dry. There wasn't much bird life around either on the sea, or beach.I did see the following species: Sanderling; Grey Plover; Oystercatcher; Dunlin; Herring Gull; B/H/Gull; Common Gull.
From here we went to Leysdowne Beach. There was more birds here, mainly on the shoreline and beach, again nothing visible on the sea. Species seen: Herring, B/H, and Common Gulls; Curlew; Oystercatcher; Redshank; Sanderling; Grey Plover. In the field on the other side of the road: C/Crow; Magpie; W/Pigeon; Blackbird. The birds wan't that close, and the weather wasn't that good for taking photo's but I did attempt a few.

Grey Plover facing the waves.

Oystercatcher.

Dunlin

Black Headed Gull flying overhead.

Black Headed Gull.

Next stop was to be the Harty Ferry Rd, taking a slow drive all the way to the Ferry Inn car park. The most numerous bird about was Lapwing. We stopped at Capel Fleet to scan the water only to find it, apart from a few birds, empty. All we saw was Teal, and Mallard.There was 2 Stonechat near the pull in area. Further along the road there was 32 Corn Bunting in a big bush on the left. Then Ian spotted a female Harrier quartering the fields ahead of us, and it turned out to be a Hen, so hoping to get a photo of it I asked him to put his foot down a bit, well, it was keeping well ahead of us, and we got up to 30+ mph and it still left us behind, so that was that, then it doubled back towards Capel Fleet, but as it happens, we saw another female Hen Harrier  not far away from where we saw the first one. Not close, but I did get a redord shot of her.

Female Hen Harrier.

The other species seen  was: Mute Swan; Mallard; Marsh Harrier; Goldfinch; Greenfinch; Chaffinch; C/Dove; 1 Hare sprinting; C/Crow; W/Pigeon; Stock Dove; Rock Dove; Blackbird; Reed Bunting; Fieldfare; Mistle Thrush; L/T/Tit; Red Legged Partridge; Pheasant; L/B/B, Herring, Common, and B/H/Gulls.
Once at the Inn car park we went about adding to the days list. It soon became apparent that it wasn't going to be a lot.The best find was a pair of Red Breasted Mergansers. There was also many Brent Geese on Horse Sands, and apart from the regular Gulls the rest was made up of: Cormorant; Shelduck; Redshank; Oystercatcher; Bar Tailed Godwit; Curlew; Lapwing; Dunlin..
On the way back I checked the usual ditch for the Green Sandpiper, but this time I couldn't find it.