Witham and District (Essex)

A brief summary of our visit to EWT Abberton Reservoir in June is as follows.

Although not blessed with good weather and having poor visibility, a small but hardy group of us managed to see a reasonable number of birds at the Layer Breton Causeway (LBC).

Those with eagle eyes (plus additional help from Fred's scope) had a good view of the nesting Spoonbills, plus Grey Herons and Egrets.
A highlight was a beautiful Marsh Harrier sweeping over the reed beds hunting for food, likely feeding young at this time of year.
My personal favourites were the Swifts, Barn Swallows and House Martins swooping across the water to catch insects, with the bonus of a large number of Swifts swirling across the road at the Layer Road Causeway as we drove towards the Essex Wildlife Trust Visitor Centre entrance.

Once again we were grateful for the regular birders at LBC who happily share their knowledge, and made sure we saw the lone Ruddy Shelduck.

We managed about 50 minutes bird watching before the torrential rain set in, and were pleased overall with a 27 species bird count. The cup of tea and chat in the EWT cafeteria was also extremely welcome!

Thanks to everyone for your support, enthusiasm and photos. All suggestions for future visits and events are welcome.

Our list of bird species sightings, (almost entirely from the Layer Breton Causeway), as follows:

Plus one Little Grebe on the pond at the EWT Visitor Centre.

Only a very small gallery of images from our visit is shown below, due to the weather and generally poor light conditions. (Photos provided by Ian).

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