Trip reports

Pulborough Brooks

Male snipe singing in the rain

Sunday, 14 December 2008

Our last weekend event for 2008 was a trip to the RSPB reserve at Pulborough Brooks. We were fortunate that the weather stayed dry. The previous day, there was torrential rain all day. This resulted in the banks of the river over flowing into the flood plain that is the reserve. Quite spectacular! This had an impact on the birds there as we will see later. On arrival we spent some time watching the constant activity on the feeders by the entrance to the visitors centre. There were numerous great and blue tits, with additional visits from coal and marsh tits, a nuthatch and a great spotted woodpecker. On the ground a dunnock, the first of many robins, a pheasant and a pair of moorhens were picking up on the loose seeds.
We walked through the paths to the first hide, taking the anti clock wise route. This rewarded us with a goldcrest, song thrush, blackbird, kestrel, wren, long tailed tit and the first redwing of the winter for the group. On arrival at the view point over the flood plain we quickly realised that the water level was rising quite quickly from the cascade over the river embankments. There were good numbers of pintail, lapwing and wigeon along with shoveler , mallard, moorhen, gadwall, mute swan and canada geese. The few pieces of grass that protruded above the water level held a surprising number of snipe. As the water levels increased these birds were seen to fly to the next area, with the numbers in each location building during the day.
Proceeding from hide to hide we continued to add to the variety of species seen. A reed bunting and a stonechat perched on a fence above the encroaching water. A green woodpecker was feeding on ants just in front of our hide window. A buzzard flew into the bushes on the far side of the river and perched for a while. Starling and pied wagtails were present and a single little grebe was found. There was a small flock of black-tailed godwits, 2 ruff and 3 dunlin. A kingfisher flew by the hide perching briefly before leaving. A large roosting duck with a reddish buff plumage caused a debate over it's identity. Eventually we decided that it must be a ruddy shelduck. Not a bird normally seen in the UK, so it is most likely an escapee.
On the return path to the visitors centre we were treated to a superb close up view of a male bullfinch.