Little Hadham Birding: Rainham Marsh and Elmley NNR.

A presentation to give in Bromley last night gave me the chance to leave early and spend time at Rainham Marsh. Here, a walk around the whole reserve gave distant views of some good bird species, without anything being outstanding. A common snipe on the scrape immediately outside the VC, along with shoveler, wigeon, teal and mallard. Several lapwings and plenty of hovering kestrels as I headed to the first hide, having checked the cordite area for migratory passerines. A single chiffchaff was my reward. Little grebe and wildfowl with an extremely distant marsh harrier to the west, probably closer to Dagenham than Rainham!

Greylags, grey herons and a little egret as I wandered to the shooting butt hide, but very little from here apart from 2 bearded tits over.

At the last hide, a kingfisher came on to a post for a matter of seconds, before flying off to another fishing post a little further away. A green shank flying towards the Thames was the final bird of the day, along with flocks of linnets and goldfinches on the feeders.

From here, I crossed the Thames and arrived at Cliffe, where persistent rain forced me to the car and on to the Isle of Sheppey and Elmley. Not too much time here, so just a drive through to the car park, hoping for short eared owls. None, but common buzzard and meadow pipits along with the resident lapwing and grey herons before I headed back to the motorway and arrived in Bromley in plenty of time to set up and give the presentation on the Birds of Sri Lanka.