Autumnal Birds.

 During the Autumn and early Winter I have had a few nice encounters with birds, both locally and on a few trips within the Sussex border.

Very close to home, we had 2 Black Redstart in our Close for a single day. This is not that unusual, as most years we do get these birds visiting and sometimes they stay around for several days.

Black Redstart.

A few days later Lisa and I headed to Warnham Nature Reserve near Horsham. It's quite a distance from Seaford, so it's not a reserve that I often get to, but it can be very good sometimes with woodland feeders and lakes, so there is a good diversity of species here. We did hit luck with one of the local Kingfishers that came quite close to the hide.

Kingfisher.

A Heron also posed well as it rested on a perch in the water.

Heron.

Two visits to Rye Harbour brought the regular over wintering Spotted Redshank, a bird that has always avoided me over the past couple of years. The first visit was with David, where we also got lucky with the Spoonbill. This bird is normally asleep, but for once it woke up and looked a bit more interesting.

 The 2nd visit with Lisa wasn't quite as good as the Spoonbill was asleep, and the Spotted Redshank only showed late on in the visit. However, we did see a Dartford Warbler. We also had better views of 2 Goosander.

Spotted Redshank.

Spoonbill.

Goosanders.

On the local downland I found the Stonechats that I photographed several times last Spring. Once again, the female was quite approachable. I daresay I will be heading back soon for another session with these birds.

Female Stonechat.

A visit to Arundel turned out to be a very wet session, even sitting in the hide was cold and miserable, although the Common Snipe helped cheer us up a little.

Common Snipe.

We also had a hopeful hunt for Jack Snipe locally, but only saw more Common Snipe. Although another Heron did show well.

Heron.