A Tour of South-east Essex - Part 1

29th September 2024

It's that in-between time of year when most of the summer visitors have left for warmer climes and the winter visitors have yet to arrive so time for a tour of South-east Essex to see what we can find, starting with Two Tree Island. We arrived two hours before high tide so headed straight for Monty's Look-out overooking the scrape behind the sea wall.

The first bird to appear was a Chiffchaff looking for tasty morsels amongst the dead Hemlock.

That was the only passerine on show so lets get on with the waders. There were a few Redshank feeding around the lagoon but most were already in the high tide roost at the far end of the scrape, but far fewer than normal.

Also a few Avocets feeding nearby. The second and third photos show a juvenile with brown on the wings rather than black.

Also a few scattered groups settling down for a sleep.

Plovers were well represented with Lapwing, Ringed Plover and Grey Plover. This is a juvenile Lapwing with a small crest and pale fringes to the feathers.

Two Tree Island is an ever-changing scene. I have already mentioned the lower than normal numbers of Redshank. Well, on my last visit about five weeks ago there wasn't a single Ringed Plover and today there were a couple of hundred. Also a few Dunlin but in a significant minority.

Once or twice the plovers were spooked which produced a great flying display.

There were also a few Grey Plovers around including this juvenile.

But the most numerous wader today was the Black-tailed Godwit and a few individuals were feeding quite close to the hide

This one had located a lugworm and was having a tug of war.

It eventually won the battle...............

..................and if you look closely you can see the serrated edge to the body of the worm These are the external gills.

I have often seen squabbles between godwits, but this is the first time I have seen them actually lock bills.

There were a few large groups of godwits with more birds arriving all the time until there must have been 1000+ present.

Well another superb visit to two Tree Island and now on to Gunners Park.