I woke early again this morning and saw that the rain had not yet arrived. So it was up and out heading for Farmoor with the Red-necked Grebe my target bird. I knew that the car park doesn’t open until eight so parked outside and walked in along a path that comes out on the southern bank of F1. The plan was to scan from here and hopefully find the grebe and then to walk round to get a close view. On reaching the edge of the reservoir I was amazed to see the Red-necked right in front of me about twenty yards from the edge. Talk about luck. I watched it for a few minutes then had a scan of the rest of the reservoir. Plenty of Great Crested Grebes, Cormorants and gulls were seen. I was just wondering if a walk right round would be worthwhile when a Thames Water van that was doing the rounds stopped and informed me that I shouldn’t be on-site before eight o’clock. It was only twenty past seven, I had seen what I wanted and the weather was deteriorating so it was an easy choice to head back to the car. On the way home I stopped off at Sainsburys to do a bit of shopping and still managed to be home before half-eight.
wiltshirebirder 