HAM WALL – GREYLAKE – HAM WALL STARLING ROOST
WEATHER: a beautiful sunny day
It was a classic winter’s day today, a crisp bright day, with all-day sunshine and not a whiff of air, the light was magical which exemplified the winter colours. All things were bright and beautiful.
After defrosting the minibus we set off from our hotel in Meare for the very short trip to Ham Wall, my birding pal Guy Campbell joined us for today’s outing. We arrived at Ham Wall car park around 8:45, the birding started straight away with some common garden birds logged around car park .
A short way along the track we found Goldcrest and a couple of Chiffchaffs, with Coal Tit, Dunnock, Wren and Song Thrush quickly added as we commenced our walk along the main track. We also listed most of the common species of duck: Mallard, Teal, Wigeon, Shoveler, Gadwall, Tufted Duck and Common Pochard.
From VP1 (view Point 1|) we watched Great and Little Egret, Cormorants, Great crested Grebes, Moorhen and Coots, several Marsh Harriers were floating gentle over the reedbeds.
the group with Guy (far left) at View Point 1
Further along the track more woodland and garden birds were added to the list: we saw Goldfinches, Chaffinches, Treecreeper, Siskins (a couple of large flocks) and to our great delight we found several Bullfinches.
male Bullfinch at ham Wall
From VP2 we added a male Goldeneye what a beauty, also Canada and Greylag Geese, some Common Snipe and more Siskins. The return journey was just as good, we took our time and enjoyed a great variety of species. New birds kept appearing: we saw Jay, Great Spotted Woodpecker, Reed Bunting and our first Grey Heron.
a very shy Reed Bunting playing hide-and-seek
For lunch we drove to the Avalon Marshes Visitor’s Centre where we enjoyed hot food and a hot drink, we added Common Buzzard, House Sparrow and Pied Wagtail to our trip list whilst we ate. We then drove to RSPB Greylake and what a great visit we had there.
Siskin
a pair of Siskins
From 1:30 until 3 pm we sat in the ‘Tree Top’ Hide watching many species and adding quite a few goodies to our list. Guy put on his Birding Guru Hat and started finding some great birds, first he pointed out a Barn Owl which was quartering the fields beyond the marsh. Then he found a group of Bearded Tits about 15m from the hide and then he spotted the Merlin as it flew in and perched not very far away.
Bearded Tit
We searched for Baikal Teal which was not present today but instead we enjoyed the fleeting glimpses of Water Rails, the Stonechats along the fenceline, distant Buzzards, close up Marsh Harriers, a hovering Kestrel and two fly-by Sparrowhawks. The Barn Owl came very close to the hide at one stage and some Common Snipe were very obliging too. A few Pintail were seen well and we heard Cetti’s Warbler.
female Merlin
Around 3pm we left Greylake and returned to Ham Wall to watch the Starling Roost, which, with perfect weather conditions, looked promising. A lot of people gathered at VP1 and the Starlings did not let us down, they arrived in impressive numbers but did not perform their sky dancing performance. Only when a Peregrine Falcon flew over did they start to panic and gather in tight knitted groups form some great shapes, but that was short and sweet.
Common Snipe taken at Greylake
One final bird for the day list was the appearance of a Glossy Ibis, it dropped down into the pool in front of us and later flew towards Glastonbury. It took us nearly 30 minutes to drive back to Meare from Ham Wall because of the huge number of cars leaving at the same time, we made it back to the hotel by 5:30pm, well satisfied with our superb day out, we listed just under 70 species.
a slither of a Moon at the Starling Roost