Trip reports

Bedfont Lakes - by Geoff Allan

Wednesday, 12 November 2008

Weather: - Dry and sunny with light winds. --- What a day. I got to the car park at 9.30 am with Mick and Dennis in tow not knowing how many others were going to turn up as the last two walks were poorly attended. This time a fantastic 16 of us were to make the trip around Bedfont Lakes. Frank, if you want to know the secret of getting people to attend I will impart my knowledge to you (for a small fee).
I had called into Bedfont Lakes the day before to see if they would agree to me taking the group through the nature reserve side which they gladly agreed to. When all were gathered we set off firstly to South Lake. Here we had mallard, gadwall, tufted duck, pochard, mute swan, coot and moorhen. Later I found that someone had seen a kingfisher here. We then moved off to the Nature Reserve gate where I put the wrong combination into the lock, which of course would not unlock. I did get it right the second time and off we set. Walking along the track we picked up a grey heron over-flying and a green woodpecker sitting at the top of a dead tree enjoying the sunshine. I had been told that a firecrest was with the tit flock at the junction, so we stopped for about 20 minutes in the hope of finding it, but sadly it did not show. We did however get chaffinch, goldfinch, great tit, blue tit, long-tailed tit and a goldcrest. We then went to the Reed Bed hide. Here we had more of the same duck but added a couple of great crested grebe to the list. Then it was back along the track to the Tern Hide, again stopping at the junction to check out the tit flock, but still no firecrest. The Tern Hide was again quiet but there was a large flock of pochard with an equal number of tufted duck. On the way back we had two raptors, a sparrowhawk was picked up by the main group and a kestrel seen by Dave C and Mick who were hanging back. We then left the nature reserve without me messing up the code and set off around the other side of South Lake. This added nothing new, neither did the walk through to North Lake past Bittern Hide. On the way to Black Hide we had a fly over by a great-spotted woodpecker. North lake itself firstly gave us two water rail and a common snipe. By now it was gone 12.00 pm so most left at this point, leaving 5 of us to go to the end of North Lake to check out the gulls. Mostly black-headed but also a couple of common gulls. On the fields there were good numbers of goldfinch and pied wagtail, also a few linnet and meadow pipits. That is when we finished and returned to the cars. I really enjoy these walks during the week, more so when the numbers are good (people that is). Birds, well we finished with a total of 37, which for just a morning was good.

Geoff A