Recent sightings from 12 to 18 November 2018
The week started with a Kestrel waiting for us at the car park when locking up on Monday morning. This set the tone for another interesting week at the Newport Wetlands. Big flocks of Redwings and Fieldfares could be seen all around the visitor centre as well as all over the reserve where they continued to pick up the remaining berries from the hedgerows. The starlings continued to impress the visitors with great displays and attracted the attention of not only the spectators, but also of the raptors. On Friday, two Sparrowhawks caused some havoc amongst the Starlings and on Saturday a Peregrine was out getting itself a little supper. Marsh harriers can be seen patrolling over the reedbeds on a nearly daily basis. It is always something special to see the Bittern and it has been quite active this week. One lucky visitor saw it circling over the reedbeds for six minutes on Saturday. The same day the Little owl was also spotted for the first time in quite a while and on Sunday a Great white egret was recorded. At Goldcliff Lagoons there were still some Water pipits around, but highlights were a Grey phalarope on Tuesday and a female Scaup on Friday.
Bittern, Blackbird, Black-headed gull, Black-tailed godwit, Blue tit, Bullfinch, Buzzard, Canada goose, Carrion crow, Cetti's warbler, Chaffinch, Chiffchaff, Cormorant, Curlew, Dunlin, Dunnock, Fieldfare, Gadwall, Goldfinch, Great white egret, Great spotted woodpecker, Great tit, Green sandpiper, Green woodpecker, Greenfinch, Greenshank, Grey heron, Grey phalarope, Herring gull, House sparrow, Jackdaw, Jay, Kestrel, Kingfisher, Lapwing, Lesser black-backed gull, Little egret, Little grebe, Little owl, Long-tailed tit, Magpie, Mallard, Marsh harrier, Mistle thrush, Merlin, Moorhen, Mute swan, Oystercatcher, Peregrine, Pheasant, Pied wagtail, Pochard, Raven, Redwing, Reed bunting, Robin, Scaup, Shelduck, Shoveler, Snipe, Sparrowhawk, Starling, Stonechat, Teal, Water pipit, Water rail, Wigeon, Willow tit, Wood pigeon and Wren.
Please note that we take our recent sightings list from the visitor sightings board that anyone can contribute to. This is great as everyone can get involved, but obviously can lead to potential errors too as they aren’t always verified! We try to keep this list as accurate as possible but if you see something unusual feel free to comment here!
Photo credit: Kestrel by Steve Jones