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Time for another of my rather infrequent updates, as I STILL can't access the RSPB website from Elmley. We're still trying to fix the problem, but it's a slow process. Highlight of the month so far was the discovery of a grey phalarope on the Flood reservoir on Saturday night. It was still...

Another 2 weeks has passed & still no joy in getting onto the RSPB website at Elmley - a real conundrum. I have been sent another possible fix that I will try when I return to Kingshill Farm, but I'm currently at Northward Hill, hence the chance for a further up-date about what's hip &...

First of all, apologies for the lack of blog up-dates in the past week or so - for some reason I've been unable to access the RSPB website from here and so haven't been able to add anything. Not that there hasn't been anything happening! As people may have seen from the Forum comments...

Plenty of stuff around for the good numbers of visitors that visited Elmley over the weekend. Where to start? The 3 spoonbills remained faithful to the Flood most of the time, although they can sometimes be difficult to see when they choose to feed in the deeper channels. Still at least 3 garganey...

As the highest tide of this series was yesterday, I sort of expected that the wader roost at Wellmarsh hide today wouldn't be quite as good. Funny how things are: there were more waders and a much better variety today. There are increasing numbers of juvenile curlew sandpipers (28) and little stint...

Most of yesterdays taiga sandpipers had moved on today - only a few green sandpipers & no reports of wood sandpiper at all. However these were replaced by a flock of high Arctic breeders as 46 curlew sandpipers appeared on the Flood at high tide. These were all juveniles, so it looks as though curlew...

A quick tour of the hides on the top of the tide produced some excellent birding. But before that, a look over the saltmarsh from the benches at Wellmarsh produced 2 black terns, 250 grey plover, 50 dunlin, 2 whimbrel & 2 bar-tailed godwit. Around the Flood, now 2 little stints (an adult & a...

The adult curlew sandpiper remains on the Flood today, again showing from Wellmarsh hide. Other waders around the hides included 20 spotted redshank, 1 greenshank, 6 ruff, 85 ringed plover, 2 LRP, 3 grey plover, 12 golden plover, 26 dunlin, 2 knot, 4 turnstone, 1 bar-tailed godwit, 56 black-tailed godwit...

While I was out checking the livestock this afternoon, I flushed 2 spoonbills from the edge of the reservoir. Unfortunately, they headed off across the Swale in the direction of Oare Marshes, where they seem to have been seen more regularly just recently. This was the first record since the end of July...

Despite 6mm of rain falling in the space of 15 minutes or so during this afternoon's thunder storm, I still had to run the big Syke's 6" diesel pump onto the Flood for a few hours to top up dwindling water levels. It would be nice to be able to rely on rainfall to keep the Flood wet at the...

No sign today of Saturday's pectoral sandpiper, but wader numbers & variety continue to increase. High tide this evening saw the following waders on the reserve: 12 spotted redshank, 1 greenshank, 275 curlew, 4 whimbrel, 5 ruff, 105 black-tailed godwit, 1 bar-tailed godwit, 35 grey plover, 7...