Visit to Slimbridge WWT : 30th June 2011

Visit to Slimbridge WWT : 30th June  2011

From the New Forest we drove to Bristol on the 29th where we stayed overnight. This enabled us to break our return journey up into stages and in Bristol we caught up with an old friend of ours. Next morning we just had a short drive to decided to Slimbridge where again we were staying at the Tudor Arms pub in Slimbridge village. We had an afternoon to fill so we were looking forward to spending it at Slimbridge WWT. The weather started off a bit poor but picked up slowly. The previous time we were here we had somehow managed to miss going to the SOuth Hide so this time we made sure by going there first. As soon as we sat down we spotted what we took to be an Egret but it looked a bit big to be a Little Egret. Was it a Great White Egret then ? Well, no, it was better than that because on the odd occasion when it unfolded itself from its slumbers it revealed itself to be a Spoonbill !

It had all the photographers on tenterhooks waiting for it to unstuck its bill so they could get their pictures. As well as this there were large numbers of Black Tailed Godwits, Black-headed Gulls, Redshank, Moorhens, Lapwings, Tufted Ducks  and Mallards with lesser numbers of Oystercatcher, Coots and Mute Swans. We spent a long time sitting there admiring the Spoonbill and just taking in the masses of birds sitting right in front of the panoramic windows.

We left the South hide and as we looked up into the trees at the far side of the reserve we could see what looked to be  several hundred Rooks lift up from their roost in the trees and wheel around before settling back down again. We next went to the Zeiss Hide where there were Lapwing, Shelduck, Coot and Mute Swan. In the bushes and reeds we saw Reed Bunting and Reed Warbler.

Moving on to the Kingfisher Hide we saw a family of Blackcaps in a bush at the side and in the shrubbery at the side of the pond Warblers darted around though it was hard to see what they were exactly. There are no Kingfishers there this year and it would seem it has been a while since the glory days of Kingfishers on this site. Heron, Coot and Moorhen were in the water and Blackbirds and Goldfinches were in the bushes.

We spent quite a lot of time there but the afternoon was wearing on and we returned to the pub for a rest and then dinner before driving home after our week or birding.

Bird List