RSPB Frampton Marsh and 3 Year Ticks

A couple of times a year I help lead a walk for the Chesterfield RSPB Group. Today's walk took us to the RSPB's reserve of Frampton Marsh in search of waders and winter visitors. In total we recorded 48 species of birds, including a year tick for me; Pectoral Sandpiper. Here's a heavily cropped photo showing all the relevant identification features (the sharp cut off between the dark breast feathers and the white belly, yellowish legs and the white supercilium.)

Pectoral Sandpiper

First up the waders. In total we spotted 13 species of wader on the reserve today. The highlights for me were 2 Little Stints and the Pectoral Sandpiper, but the sight of a few hundred Black-tailed Godwit, 30+ Snipe, Golden Plover, Knot, Bar-tailed Godwit, Lapwing, Avocet (c.15), Redshank,
Ringed Plover, Ruff and Curlew were all very as well.

Waterbirds were much in evidence today with 100s of Brent Geese flying between the saltmarsh and the lagoons, 100s of Teal and Wigeon on the scrapes, along with Mallards, Pintail, Gadwall, Shoveler, Moorhen, Coot, Mute Swan, Shelduck, Grey Heron, Little Egret, Canada and Greylag Geese across the site.

Finally, several gull species were seen (Great and Lesser Black-backed, Common, Black-headed and Herring), along with a couple of Marsh Harriers, a Kestrel and several smaller bird species (Starling, Reed Bunting, Yellowhammer, Linnet, Skylark, Redwing, Crow, Meadow Pipit, Greenfinch, Goldfinch, Magpie and Pheasant).

Year List update:
177 - Bar-tailed Godwit
178 -Pectoral Sandpiper
179 - Brent Goose