WHITE-FRONT and SMEW still present

WEDNESDAY 9 FEBRUARY

ROOKERY PIT SOUTH (BEDFORDSHIRE) (1400 hours)
(View this private pit only from the public footpath viewpoint at the SE corner at SP 019 403)

Following Steve Blain's posting, I was very pleased to finally catch up with the redhead SMEW that had been present in the Stewartby area since late December 2010 - the bird showing very well roll-preening along the southern shore, just beyond the reedbed. It represented my 112th species in the county this year.

Also present were 3 Great Crested Grebes, 1 Little Grebe, 33 Mute Swans, 18 Common Teal, 2 Eurasian Wigeon, 15 Tufted Duck, 69 Northern Pochard, 28 Coot, 500+ Black-headed Gulls, 446 Common Gulls, 9 Herring Gulls, 14 Lesser Black-backed Gulls and 2 Stock Dove.

MEADOW LANE GRAVEL WORKINGS (BEDFORDSHIRE)

The first-winter EURASIAN WHITE-FRONTED GOOSE (pale pink bill and orange legs and narrow white forehead blaze) was still present amongst 140 or so Greylag Geese and 200+ Atlantic Canada Geese to the north of the Bedford sewage treatment works at the north end of the gravel pits at SP 085 505.

There were also a few Little Grebes, Gadwall and Wigeon present on the pits but no sign of either the Water Pipit or Common Chiffchaff at the sewage works (whilst Jim Gurney solitarily flushed a single Jack Snipe from the hardstanding pools at Octagon Farm).