Stanpit Marsh NR - Sat 10 Dec

An early start as I left Ellie asleep in bed, picked up my mate Steve from Yeovil and drove down to Stanpit Marsh, arriving a little before 8.30am and meeting John for a day's birding. We spent about ninety minutes walking around the reserve, and there were plenty of birds about. Waders were pretty numerous, with lots of Dunlin, Black-tailed Godwits and Redshank....with smaller numbers of Turnstone, Grey Plover and Bar-tailed Godwits. The marshy area held a flock of at least twenty Meadow Pipits and a few Skylarks, and surprisingly a couple of Green Woodpeckers. But the highlight of the morning came in the form of not one, but three Kingfishers...all of which showed extremely well.

A quick walk out on to Priory Marsh produced a couple of Egyptian Geese and a male Stonechat, but little else of note and as we were in the area, we quickly popped down to Avon Beach to see if there was anything out ot see, but we only saw four Great Crested Grebes, so didn't linger and headed off inland.