Shellness, Sheppey

7274 birds of 61 species today at Shellness HERE. In true autumn 2021 form I didn't find anything particularly interesting in what was my last ditch attempt on the back of a short period of easterlies in the dusk of autumn before winter true unfolds. Even dipped the Shorelarks that were there yesterday and my target species to find, which was Snow Bunting, were found in a couple of sites nearby. However it was still brilliant to see the Thames Estuary winter waterbirds and Black-throated Diver and Razorbill are not too bad for the area.    

In the afternoon I decided to check out Warden Point but for a different type of birding. The Eocene geology here has hosted some prehistoric bird species fossils and I've been meaning to do a quick recee for a while. Jacob is dinosaur and prehistoric creature mad so am hoping to start doing some fossil hunting with him soon. Fortunately I bumped into one of the admin of the London Clay Fossil Facebook Group who very generously gave me two shark teeth and a fossil crab (which he had just found) from 48-52 million years ago when Sheppey was joint to North America, situated nearer the equator and was a sub-tropical sea teeming with prehistoric shark, turtles, crabs, lobsters with a delta nearby populated by prehistoric pelicans, rollers and waterfowl. The guy I spoke to has actually found a new prehistoric bird species for science on Sheppey, now that is a rarity find in a different league. 

Shellness Brents and waders. The high tide roost included 3000 Oystercatcher and 2000 Knot. Not a sub-tropical sea today but an equally impressive major estuary and internationally important bird area. Amazing the pages of evolution, stacked up on top of each other like old newspapers, with todays paper on top and today's ink being these Brents and waterbirds.  Chilling how temporary and fragile everything is especially as the Sixth great extinction unfolds, presumably we are the first creature to see the risk of our own extinction coming and also the only one that could ever have a chance to do anything about it.   

About 50 Sanderling (above) and about 350 Dunlin (below) in the high tide roost 

Grey Plover

Juvenile Red-throated Divers in the estuary- about 10 of these. The off shore waters in the Thames Estuary is one of the most important wintering area for Red-throated Divers in UK.

Had this Black-throated Diver fly up the Swale

Eocene Shark teeth and Crab (will get scientific names for these soon)

The fossiliferous cliffs of Warden Point. Deep water marine deposits from when Sheppey was a sub-tropical shark infested sea which has evolved in the present to a cockney holiday hub and internationally important site for waterbirds (a RAMSAR site).