Snowfall at Reculver

This morning on his daily wander around Reculver Chris Hindle saw 21 Snow Buntings on the beach c300yds east of the towers and after seeing that there appeared to be some sunshine forecast for late afternoon, I decided to make a visit after work in the hope of seeing them and maybe an airing for the camera. I arrived around 4pm where the sun was indeed shining and very pleasant it was too. I wandered on down the seawall noting 2 Little Egret, 1 Marsh Harrier over the Oyster farm, c16 Redshank, c20 Mute Swan, 2 Ringed Plover, c15 Oystercatcher, 2 Curlew, c20 Linnet and 1 Meadow Pipit. I couldn't find any Snow Buntings where I expected them to be but further down towards Coldharbour I found 1 Snow Bunting sitting up nicely on the shingle in the late afternoon sunshine. I fired off a few shots but the bird was very wary and soon flew off calling and out of sight. Not much was around Coldharbour except for a good number of Gulls but I couldn't find anything special amongst them. Walking back I met Julian Perry and we walked on back to the towers. Julian had seen c15 Snow Buntings on his way down and I can only assume I must have walked past these birds on the way down. We reached the point Julian had seen them in but we could not find them but walking back towards the towers we soon saw c20 Snow Buntings take flight and they flew past us 'trilling' as they went. They eventually dropped down a few hundred yards further on. Hopefully they will hang around for my week off next week and lets hope for some better weather as well. The photos below were taken in October last year at Reculver.

 Snow Bunting