There are now two purple herons on the reserve. They put on a great show flying around over Denge Marsh and Hooker’s pits yesterday evening. Other sightings yesterday included hobby, four wood sandpipers, black-tailed godwit, cuckoo,whinchat and lesser whitehroat.
Numbers of roosting Whimbrel on the Quarry are low this year. It did seem possible that another site was being used on Harbour Farm by some birds. So this morning before sunrise all the pools were checked, but sadly no Whimbrel were found. The peak count this year has been 107 (very similar to last years), numbers have already started dropping and seem unlikely to rise again, 48 birds departed this morning. On a positive note 42 Avocet were found on one of the pools this morning and at least 450 Common Terns were roosting on the Quarry islands. 60 Swift and 20 House Martins were feeding above Long Pit. At Castle Water YESTERDAY a Bittern, Hobby and 15 House Martin gave great views from the viewpoint and 30 Hairy Hawker exuviae were collected from the ditch north of the hide 19 female and 11 male, small numbers of Azure Damselfly are also emerging.
Female pre-flight emergent Hairy Dragonfly yesterday at Castle Water