Saturday 18th August 2012

   I had left it as long as we could, but the draw of the Black-crowned Night Heron at Pennington Marshes in Hampshire, finally got the better of me. Especially as my niece had said this was one of the bird she wanted to see. A Red Kite at the M4/A34 junction near Chieveley services was a good start. We got to Pennington, parked and went straight to the footpath, from here the Heron had been seen for quite a while, on & off. No sign, but it had been seen earlier in the day. At least its still about. We went off to the marshes to see what else we could find. Not a bad haul, as it turns out. We had at least 6 Wood Sandpipers, one of each of Green & Common Sandpipers, some Dunlin, Snipe, Redshank and a couple of Ruff too. Sparrowhawk, Kestrel and Buzzard were seen. At the end of the track, the Solent, there were quite a few Turnstones and Common Terns. A group of Black-headed Gulls on one of the pools held one adult winter Med Gull too. Then back to see the Heron, but no sign again, what a pain......