A ROUGH MORNING AT GROVE !

With Heathy desperate to return to his spiritual home a trip to Grove was arranged yesterday.  I arrived just before six o;clock and strolling down the entrance track Nightingale, Cetti's Warbler and 'purring' Turtle Dove soon were in the notebook.  Marc was so excited to be 'home' he had already made it to Harrison's and we soon added the first of 24 GREENSHANK seen during the session.  Greylag Geese were in the adjoining fields, two with large families and a Yellow Wagtail whizzed calling overhead.  We strolled to the White House adding Whitethroat and Blackcap.  Marc decided a walk along the road to Middle Grove in search of RED LEGGED PARTRIDGE was rewarded with 2 walking sensibly along the road facing the oncoming traffic.  Chasing them down the road Heathy managed two rear view photographs of the Partridges which will be for his own personal consumption.  We soon added Grey Partridge and a very vocal and showy Yellowhammer before we made our way to the Marsh Hide.  Marsh Harriers put on a very impressive show for us before Martyn arrived and was soon followed by Steve Ashton, the celebrated twice winner of 'Bird Guides' photograph of the week. Marc, myself and Martyn continued the circuit adding 16 Common Tern on the main lake at Stodmarsh and a flyover COMMON SANDPIPER.  We made our way round to the Water Meadows adding a single Green Sandpiper. The meadows were fairly busy and we soon added more Greenshank, Ruff, Redshank, Dunlin and two WOOD SANDPIPER.  Marc managed to pick up a distant Swift which was a year tick for all of us and while Martyn and I were searching the skies for it Martyn found a real mega for all of us which was a ROUGH-LEGGED BUZZARD.  It took a few minutes to finally clinch the ID and after watching it for 15 minutes it finally drifted off over Under Trees Farm.  This was only the 2nd record for Martyn at Grove and a new bird for Marc and myself.  We walked back to the car adding Cuckoo, Sparrowhawk and a Lesser Whitethroat.  It was a great session, really good to spend time back at Grove and great to see Martyn again and a massive thank you to the Swift for giving us the opportunity to see something we would have probably missed.