Winter Visitors

With Christmas and the New Year packed away, I finally managed to arrange a day out birdwatching with a friend.  A real chance to kick off my year list which up to now consisted of only the common garden birds and a few I had seen flying over.  Unfortunately, the day we chose coincided with the first real wintry conditions of the year, with temperatures in low single figures, showers and a brisk northerly wind.  

As we approached our destination, Abberton reservoir, the first new bird for my list flew across in front of the car. It was a ghostly white, little egret. My friend recalled the time twenty years ago when he went on a ‘twitch’ to see this now established species. We parked on the lower causeway and surveyed the wide expanses of choppy grey water dotted with wildfowl and gulls. As it was raining, we opened the car window on the leeward side and used our binoculars to scan the birds. It wasn’t long before we picked out, amongst the numerous great crested grebes and pochards, two goldeneye. From the comfort of the car we watched as these winter visitors from northern climes dived repeatedly in the cold water, disappearing from sight for what seemed a remarkably long time until bobbing back to the surface, their large white loral patch showing well even at a distance. By now the rain had stopped and somewhat reluctantly we left the car, telescopes over our shoulders, ready to brave the elements and to seek out more species. Next, we found three elegant goosanders, with their long red bills hooked at the tip, another exciting winter visitor. Among the mainly black headed gulls wheeling low overhead, was one individual with an unseasonal, almost complete, black hood and a few common gulls. Back in the relative warmth of the car we drove to the other end of the causeway and resumed our search and were soon rewarded with good views of what must be the most attractive of the sawbills, the male smew!  Breeding in northern boral forests beside water, this rather scarce duck graces our winter months with its white plumage, edged with fine lines of black. Nearby was the female, with its brown-grey upperparts and chestnut-brown head, commonly referred to as a ‘red head’.

Our year lists were growing but the cold forced us once again to retreat and this time drive to the visitor centre for a hot drink as well as information on one winter visitor that had so far eluded us, the Bewick’s swan. Despite the recent reports of around three individuals being seen, we had only found mute swans. Apart from a stonechat on the approach to the centre, we did not see any new birds from its panoramic windows but we were informed that the Bewick’s had been seen in Wigborough Bay, so now warmed, we left to find them.       

We tried from various vantage points to locate the elusive swans without luck, but on one occasion while focussing on two distant swans both with their heads underwater, we did see a male marsh harrier quartering the rough grassland in the background. The swans- they eventually raised their heads, they, like all the swans we had seen that day, had orange bills not the yellow that we had hoped for!  

We came away pleased with the birds we had seen, my year list is now at 51, and it seemed fitting to witness these winter visitors who had migrated for conditions that we found cold and bleak.