First Ever Twitch- Grey Phalarope!!!!

It's that time of year now when Phalaropes are dropping into the country from all directions. Around this time back in 1987, when one of Englands biggest and and most destructive storms hit, about 30-40 Phalaropes were sighted spread out around the London area.

Today, David Campbell had invited me to twitch the Grey Phalarope at Home Park, so I set off to meet him at Beddington SF for a quick birdwatch around there first. The sewage farm has one of the largest Tree Sparrow populations, so I was hoping for an easy lifer in the form of one of these birds, and believe it or not I found one easily.....

We also flushed a Jack Snipe (another lifer) which gave quick and unphotographable views but was still a great bird.

Then it was straight on to the Grey Phalarope at Rick Pond in Home Park. We eventually got to the park a long time after we left Beddington as we got lost and went to Bushy Park by accident! Me and David rushed to the scene as it was fading light (bad for photographs) and found the pond, along with the Grey Phalarope 10 minutes later.

It was an amazing bird (mabye a bit scruffy and plain, but it has flown from the another country to get here!) and showed very well; the bird would come up to 1 metre from me and David and it wouldn't even notice us.

I got very close shots of the bird but in fading light so the images may seem a bit blurred....

I did however, manage to get an interesting shot of the bird feeding in the late evening light.....

I managed to get a fairly decent videos of the bird as well.....