Warnham NR, Widewater Lagoon and WWT Arundel

Showers and intermittent sunshine today with very very strong winds.

I started off at Warnham hoping to see some Bramblings.  Dipped on those but many Siskins and Redpolls about in addition to the usual birds.  Out on the water nothing but gulls and one Grey Heron and lots of Tufties... the geese have all gone it seems.

From there to Widewater Lagoon.  Seven Red-breasted Mergansers of which 2 were males.

Three Brent Geese.. these might be those I saw in Ferring a couple of weeks back.

Four of six Little Grebes

and then onto WWT Arundel - which was quite flooded and some areas were inaccessible... all the surrounding areas and Pulborough (seen from Bury hill) were very very flooded as well!!

Pintail - collection bird

Bewick Swan - collection bird

Golden Eye - collection bird

Pintail - collection bird

Wild female pheasant

Long-tailed Duck - collection bird

Shovellers out from the hide...

Nice to get some fresh air for a chair and it was reasonably mild for end of January.  Although sunny the light was very 'brittle' and did have some showers... but good to be out nonetheless!!

A sunny (eventually) stroll around Hyde Park before some music!!

We set off - in rain.  Got to Hyde Park and had brekkie in Pret before going off into Hyde Park.  We saw the Bearded Tits who were hiding very effectively mid-way down in the reeds.  Too far back for any decent shots!  Then went looking for Tawny Owls.. but dipped although we were pretty sure we were in the right place.

However,  eventually the rain stopped and the sun came out.

 

 and finally, walking through Oxford Street, the statue on the Selfridges property

and so onto the concert.  Today we had:
Colin Carr (cello) and Thomas Sauer (piano)

The programme was:

Beethoven - 12 Variations on a Theme from handel's Judas Maccabeaus
Schubert - Arpeggione Sonata in A minor and
Rachmaninov - Cellow Sonatga in G minor.

I liked the Rachmaninov but somehow today the Beethoven and Schubert didn't really do much for me!

Great to have some sunshine and a pleasant concert nonetheless.