10th August 2019 - Selsey Peninsula and George V Avenue

The forecast was for gale force south westerlies up to 50mph so Dad and I arrived at Selsey Bill for 05:45 and had a seawatch hoping for a Balearic Shearwater. However despite the strong winds the sea never produced anything other than a steady stream of Gannets. Other than that the highlights were a Curlew W, a Fulmar W and a few Sandwich and Common Terns. There were also around ten Turnstones present on the beach.

After almost getting blown away at Selsey Bill we headed for Church Norton to look at the terns in the harbour. Again nothing particularly of note other than the usual Sandwich and Common Terns and a single Dunlin and Knot. We did also pick up the aberrant Common Tern which caused some excitement amongst the locals the other day.

Next stop was Sidlesham Ferry and surprisingly there was a nice selection of waders. These included a Wood Sandpiper (only my 2nd in Sussex this year), three Spotted Redshanks, six Dunlin, c30 Black-tailed Godwits and a Common Sandpiper.

Three Spotted Redshanks, Sidelsham Ferry, West Sussex

We then had a quick look around Halsey's Farm for the Squacco Heron. Upon arrival there was no sign in the usual field however we did find one of the long-staying Cattle Egrets. We had a look along the rife from the North Wall but again there was no sign of the Squacco. On the mud there were three Dunlin, two Redshank and a Common Sandpiper. Walking back towards Halsey's Farm, Dad and I had a split second flight view of what we thought was probably the Squacco Heron. We had a search but couldn't locate it. We then bumped into Matt Phelps who was also looking for it but he hadn't seen it either, whilst chatting a Peregrine passed through. Given the conditions we knocked our search on the head but around 10-15 minutes later, I had a text from Matt to say he had just had the Squacco Heron in flight. We didn't bother to go back and look but news throughout the day suggests that it returned sporadically to its usual field. 

Cattle Egret, Halsey's Farm, West Sussex

Feeling rather windswept our last stop was Ivy Lake. Not much doing here other than a few Common Terns, a few Pochard and several Great Crested Grebe families. 

Later in the evening I had another seawatch this time off George V Avenue in Worthing. Not to surprisingly it wasn't particularly fruitful. The highlight was a Bonxie which was messing around offshore and a juvenile Yellow-legged Gull loafing along the shoreline.