7 DECEMBER 2008

SUNDAY 7 DECEMBER

Another heavy frost being slow to clear and penetrating all day in some areas. Clear, dry and cold.

The Tring Reservoirs

Wilstone Reservoir
(1300 hours, extensively frozen with three distinct open sections)

With much of the reservoir frozen, it made it easier for me to undertake counts. Despite the conditions, there was very little of interest - 11 Great Crested Grebes, 1 Little Grebe, 19 Mute Swans (including a first-winter), 10 Greylag Geese, 67 Mallard, 516 Eurasian Wigeon, 241 Common Teal, just 5 Gadwall, an outstanding 235 NORTHERN SHOVELER (104 + 131), 114 Tufted Duck, 71 Northern Pochard, 4 female COMMON GOLDENEYES (in the open patch near the hide) and 3 Lapwings. 85 Common Gulls roosted (SR, DB)

Tringford Reservoir

Just 6 Mute Swans, 2 Shovelers, 3 Great Crested Grebes and 11 Coot

Startop's End Reservoir

Just 2 Great Crested Grebes, 8 Shoveler, 68 Tufted Duck and 78 Coots present. Highlight was 2 redhead GOOSANDERS - both very different in plumage (a brightly marked individual with a shaggy richly-coloured crest and strongly contrasting creamy-white underparts and a drabber bird with much less of a crest and distinctly grey underparts with little contrast. It also had much darker lores - I guess adult and first-winter).

Marsworth Reservoir
(All Steve Rodwell) 2-3 squealing WATER RAILS and 110+ CORN BUNTINGS roosted, whilst a COMMON CHIFFCHAFF was in bushes along the Grand Union Canal near Marsworth Reservoir. A pair of BLACKCAPS were also seen in Lakeside, Marsworth.

A41 Berryfields
(with Tim Watts, Tony Donnelly and others) A total of 5 SHORT-EARED OWLS hunted the fields between 1445 and 1515 hours, with a Common Kestrel successfully catching a Field Vole, a single hunting BARN OWL, 5+ COMMON STONECHATS, a Common Buzzard and a single CHINESE WATER DEER.

Weston Turville Reservoir
(1527-dusk) No sign of yesterday's BITTERN from the Susan Cowdy Hide, but 6+ squealing WATER RAILS, the continuing CETTI'S WARBLER, 15 roosting REED BUNTINGS, Grey Wagtail, Green Woodpecker, 4 Great Crested Grebes, 2 adult Mute Swans, 36 Mallard, 3 Tufted Ducks (2 drakes) and an immature drake COMMON GOLDENEYE.