Unlike dedicated twitchers who were probably on the road before sunrise, I awoke from my slumbers at 9:00am and checked the news services to see if the bird was still around. When I saw that it was I jumped into action and was soon on my way.
An hour or so later I arrived at the Queen Mother Reservoir, with welcoming smiles from the volunteers who had given up their Saturday to register those going in and out of the site - a big THANK YOU to them all.
My register number on site was close to 200 and that was only at about 10:30am, so I would love to know what they had got up to by the end of the day. It was very busy with birders walking to and from the car park.
Being a major twitch, it was not difficult to see where the bird was showing, all one had to do was just head for this lot and then look down at the causeway as it was extremely confiding and did not seem to be bothered at all with huge lenses being pointed towards it from several feet away.
Not being one for lugging huge equipment around, I managed to get my own record shot on our tiny Canon ixus (slightly out of focus but hey ho!).
A quick scan against of the reservoir then provided a Red Necked Grebe and Long Tailed Duck - Pretty amazing birding with minimal effort.
Although I could have looked at the Pipit for longer, I wanted to make the most of being in the area and decided to twitch the Grey Phalarope at Thorn in Bucks.
After a drive round the M25 car park and then up the M1, I soon arrived at the site, again welcomed by a smiling volunteer and then had an enjoyable half an hour watching the bird and chatting the friendly local birders.
A great mornings birding, made all the better by friendly birders.
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