Purfleet Again, with birds you can dance to...

Yesterday, my good freind Bexx and I decided, a little spontaneously, to take a wander around the RSPB's jewel on the Thames Estuary of Purfleet Marshes, that green and damp oasis which sits between industrial Rainham and Industrial Purfleet. I have described the site before, an open area, with few trees except at the Eastern end of the Reserve, now grazed by substantial numbers of large black cattle, and surrounded by fences of various kinds.  When we arrived, it was, inevitably, raining, but the usual goldfinch and chaffinch were on the feeders outside the visitors centre and they were joined by collared and, more unusually, three smart looking stock doves, dark grey with iridescent green flashes on their necks. The casual observer might have overlooked these smart pigeons as woodpigeon, or even feral pigeon, but they are a different species and a very handsome one at that.

View of RSPB Rainham Marshes

We wandered through the copse around the former explosives store, and arrived at the feeders, where we saw no less than three handsome male reed buntings, apparantly quite comfortable in each others company, although less comfortable in ours-we had to wait and stand still for a few moments before they were confident enough to move towards us and onto the well stocked sunflower seed feeders. A couple of Great tits also came down to feed, and there were blue tits about also. A chiffchaff could be heard calling among the wonderful horse chestnut trees, but he was not showing himself. We watched the charming Reed Buntings on the feeders and on the ground, among the straw laid down to save the volunteer who fills the feeders from the worst of the mud, for a little while before continuing around the reserve.

Reed Bunting on the feeder in the Cordite store.

From the Ken Barrat hide we could initially see only a young Mute Swan, calmly enjoying the shallow water, but after we had waited a little while we were joined by a few ducks, a couple of Tufties and some rather manic Gadwalls, a pair, the female easily separated from a female mallard by the broad, orange lines down each side of her bill. They were both diving under the water, reappearing, and chasing each other, on the water, creating no particular impression of the male chasing the female or vice versa. 'Dabbling ducks' like Gadwall feed by up-ending, grazing, or dabbling with their bills in shallow water, they do not usually dive, so I wonder if anyone else has seen similar behaviour. I wonder if they had found some particularly tasty vegetation too deep for them to dive for, or perhaps were simply trying to impress each other.
Walking up through the reeds, on the boardwalk, among the swallows (now arrived in the country, they seem to be visible all over the place) we heard a rhythmic song coming from deep in the reeds. It was comprised of whirrs and scratches, a little electronic, and it had a beat you could tap your foot to! Whoever writes the bird books which describe Reed Warbler song as "unmusical" has clearly not heard any music released in the last 60 years, it calls to mind dance music and is, in my opinion, one of the most underrated of avian vocals, and my favourite singers. Surely no bird has a stronger sense of rhythm? Another Reed Warbler singing a few metres down sounded less experienced, his voice was not quite as strong, nor his rhythm so clear. A Cettis warbler also let forth a burst of high-pitched sound, and a small brown back seen flying between the reeds could have been either species, both nondescript in appearance, they are almost uniform brown, but so distinctive and so different in their vocalisations.

Under an angry sky...

From the high-tech hide we were pleased to see a couple of very smart lapwings, some apparantly sitting on nests, and a distant Little Ringed Plover, a year tick and a spring migrant, which only seems to appear at Purfleet in late April and early May. A Little Grebe was also around doing its cute stuff, and diving about. There were several smart shelducks around and a few more flew in over our heads while we were watching.
Fortress Purfleet brings up its' drawbridge (literally, it has a drawbridge) and locks its gates, somewhat infuriatingly, at five PM, and we were faced with a rather hurried walk to the centre. We came across a couple of very obliging mute swans, big white posers that they are, who let us take a few photos, including of their massive leathery feet. Somewhere above us a Skylark was off on one, raining down its rambling techno on all below. Grey, heavy clouds, almost purple, were beginning to creep over the shooting butts, although the sun still shone in on us. Somewhere, noisy Marsh Frogs croaked and squawked, and although we saw the odd movement of water and heard the odd splash we managed not to see one.  A streamlined, elegant looking bird flew over us, and I was surprised to be able to call it, immediately, a whimbrel. Whimbrels closely resemble curlews, which are more common, but the relative shortness of the beak, and the slender, far more elegant build were actually fairly obvious in flight. It darted over the marshes, over the sea wall and across the river.  Outside the visitors centre, a dunnock sat on the wire fence, the fortress' perimeter, in full song.

 Dunnock Maestro

We left the reserve as the "lock-down crew" as they called themselves, were walking the paths locking up the hides, as "fortress Purfleet" was, appropriately, put on lockdown at five PM. Bexx and I watched the swallows on the beach and chatted about future blogging, before deciding to check out one of the Reserve's local pubs, the Royal. Its atmosphere was, we found, perfectly welcoming, and a couple of pints of Titanic ale later, we stepped outside to photograph a fiery sunset, sinking behind moody clouds above the river and the city beyond.

Purfleet Sunset