Kent - Garden of England - Day 1

As mentioned in the previous post about the American Horned Lark, Sarah and I spent a few days in North Kent visiting my son Robert and his new wife and so I also took the opportunity of doing some birding in this great county.  The main area I wanted to visit was the Isle of Sheppey which is fairly close to Chatham where Robert currently lives and which has produced some great Marsh Harrier photos on Facebook in recent days.  But there were lots of other places to have a look at too, far too many as it turned out.

Sarah and I spent the first day on Sheppey (map above), mainly in the south and west of the island.  After crossing the wonderful bridge over the Swale linking the island to mainland Kent, we headed for Shell Ness via a stop at the seaside town of Leysdown-on Sea.  The weather was a bit dull to begin with, but slowly brightened up during the day.

 

After a spot of lunch in the local cafe in Leysdown, we then headed off for the Harty Ferry Road, with it's Raptor Viewpoint at Capel Fleet.

On the way back from the ferry crossing near the Harty Inn, we called in at Harty Church and found a field full of feeding Feildfare, with some Redwings and Starlings thrown in.  As Sarah was driving I stayed in the car using it as a hide and managed to get fairly close to these great winter thrushes for once, although it was a bit awkward finding a place to shoot through the fences.