TUFTED TRIO

A mild overcast day with the breeze picking up throughout Thursday 18th, saw these three female tufted ducks drop onto the park pond, pictured here with a coot. They looked a bit nervous during their time on the pond in the morning. Other ducks on the pond included 50 mallard, 10 gadwall and 16 shoveler dropped in briefly. A grey heron stood on the clump of reedmace in one corner and a water rail called from another corner.

Behind the pond a jay managed to flush the little owl out of the hedge getting it to fly from the back of a bush and down into the middle of the hedge. A couple of song thrushes seemed a bit worried at first but the owl must've disappeared well out of view.
A male marsh harrier crossed over the fields near Bromans Farm heading north.

Andy Field reported a sizeable flock of 1200 wigeon feeding in the park's grazing fields and also the female stonechat along the seawall early in the afternoon.Around 20 chaffinches were feeding in the field near the Golfhouse.

Adrian Amos saw both the male as well as a female blackcap in his East Road garden in West Mersea during Thursday.

The moth trap hasn't been "moth-balled" for the winter season just yet! As overnight temperatures for Wednesday night were forecast to be a mild 10 degrees, it sounded like a good opportunity to set the trap up again at the park.
This December moth was the first moth to appear, dropping in about an hour after dark on Wednesday evening.

Five of these mottled umbers were sitting in the trap just after daybreak on Thursday, the first ones noted this season while the only other moth species in the trap was a winter moth.