Dungeness

A trip with Nicole and Andrew to the south-east coast of Kent and the weird and wonderful world of the shingle bank known as Dungeness. Probably more generally famous for its nuclear power station, this together with its geological features have ensured that this area remains largely undeveloped.

Our first stop was the ARC pits, now managed by the RSPB. Our target species was a group of Garganey, a small migrant duck that having bred in this country will shortly be making it’s way south for the winter. As none of us had managed to catch up with one yet this year we were keen to put this right. The most striking characteristic is the white markings of the head and I soon spotted a small duck with a prominent white head marking. However, a closer look through the telescope revealed that there were other features that did not fit and we were left to conclude this was some form of aberrant plumage in possibly a Eurasian Teal. But any way not a Garganey.

Also present were a variety of other species including Teal, Mallard, Shoveler, Coot, Cormorant, Greylag Geese and Mute Swan. Andrew eventually located one of the Garganey (7 had been reported here the previous day) and we all got good views of it.

Satisfied at having seen our target species we drove over to the main part of the reserve and in a field by the entrance, we saw Great white Egret and Little Egret. A little further down the access road a Yellow-legged Gull shared the Gull roost with herring and Black-backed Gulls. Apart from a large flock of Sand Martins, the main reserve was rather quiet and so we decided to make our way round to the point for lunch and look for Black redstart on the power station fence. On the way out we stopped again at the field where we had seen the Egrets previously and were delighted to see a Cattle Egret amongst the grazing cattle. So in this one field we had seen all 3 species of Egret in one morning. We Continued on round to the point but this area was also quiet and all we added to the day’s list was a Stonechat.

After lunch we drove round to Springfield bridge at the back of the RSPB reserve. Again there were few bird species to be seen although we did add Linnet and Marsh Harrier to the day’s list.

In all we also recorded 4 species of Butterfly and 7 species of Dragonfly plus a number of other insect species on the reserve.