Ham Wall winter feast

Ferruginous Duck

Following the Pochards

Great White Egret

Pintail

Bitterm (Back end only)

Marsh Harrier

Kingfisher

The Tor

Little Egrets

I teamed up with Chris Lane for a trip down to the RSPB Ham Wall to enjoy their seasonal feast of delights. Ham Wall is 2.5 miles west of Glastonbury in the valley of the River Brue or better known as the Somerset Levels.

Ham Wall is a nature reserve of the highest quality and is made up of rustling reed beds and glinting open water. The Starling roosts of over 750,000 birds are the star attraction for many visitors however we planned a busy day staring early.

The car park has improved considerably since I first visited a number of years ago & the toilets were a welcome sight to visitors of a certain age.

Our first star species was a Glossy Ibis that I picked up flying over us, first of a couple of sightings throughout the morning. This was quickly followed up by a Great White Egret viewed from the !st viewing platform. These Egrets first bred in the UK back in 2012 at near by Shapwick Heath and are not difficult to miss. We recorded three in total during the session.

Cetti's Warblers were calling along many of the paths and we got some fantastic views watching one creep along the bottom of the reed bed. Huge numbers of Snipe were flying in all directions, impossible to put a number of how many must be there. Chris caught a Kingfisher in flight which we refound later sat perched hoping for an early lunch. Water Rails could be heard screaming from a number of spots but we didn't see any in the open. 

At the Avalon hide we found the visiting Ferruginous Duck with a group of Pochard. This dark chestnut duck from the east really stood out as a stunning individual in the sunshine. Marsh Harriers were visible in flight whilst another was perched resting on the waters edge.

As we scanned the reed beds a fantastic Bittern wandered across one of the channels leaving me scrambling for my camera which I just caught his back end. From there I watched him creep along the reeds feeding before disappearing further back into the reed bed.

Other highlight species recorded were a male Stonechat, 4 Pintail, Shoveler, Gadwall, Great Crested Grebe, Little Grebe, Lapwing & Wigeon. A throughly enjoyable morning.