A Kentish Plover - in Somerset

With Russian White-fronted Geese and Tundra Bean Geese being reported at Slimbridge I started to plan a visit there for Saturday 10th January, however with the arrival of Storm Goretti on Thursday 8th January causing chaos with train services across the country along with the arrival of a nasty COVID-like cold making me feel quite crappy my plans were unfortunately shelved.

I'm not sure what my cold was all about, I had one at Twixtmas although it never really got going and quickly fizzled out but this one was a different beast. It started at 5am on the Thursday morning with constant sneezing which felt like hay-fever or some other kind of allergic reaction and just like my first experience with COVID back in 2022. As the day wore on it got worse and I felt achey and shivery, I did a COVID test using the last one from my NHS working days and it was negative although the test was 2 years out of date and probably not sensitive to current COVID strains in what is now a very mutated virus. I still felt crap the next day (Friday 9th) yet by the evening I felt OK, just tired and foggy headed, and the snotty nose and sneezing had stopped. By the Saturday I felt fine and the trains post Storm Goretti were also running pretty much to schedule too so a trip to Slimbridge would have been do-able but never mind.

I still had a hankering for a further-afield birding day out though and with a Kentish Plover overwintering again at Burnham-on-sea in Somerset for its 7th winter I decided to finally go and have a look for it although it can be a very tricky bird to catch up with. Being a Saturday I could use my Railcard at any time and so I bought a return ticket for £29.75 using the Split Ticketing website instead of the full £49.30 ticket price while catching exactly the same trains - ridiculous!

I have visited Burnham-on-sea just once before way back in December 2020 to see, of all things, a Russian White-fronted Goose and a Tundra Bean Goose which were associating with a flock of Greylag Geese at Apex Park, both juvenile birds of unknown provenance and ridiculously tame. The Kentish Plover had also been present on the nearby beach that day too but instead of going to look for it I decided to head back to Exeter to try and see a Dusky Warbler there and which I failed miserably to do.

Tundra Bean Goose and Russian White-fronted Goose at Apex Park, Burnham-on-sea, December 2020

Anyway, back to January 2026 and it was a cold and icy morning as I caught the 6:27am train from Plymouth but as the sun rose it became a beautiful and sunny, wintery day. The trains all ran smoothly and I arrived at Highbridge & Burnham train station at around 8:15am to start my walk along the River Brue towards the sea wall at Burnham-on-sea where the Kentish Plover is frequently seen along the beach.

The River Brue heading towards the beach at Burnham-on-sea - mobile phone shot

The Beach at Burnham-on-sea

On arriving at the seafront a report came through on Birdguides that the Kentish Plover was present and after a good lookabout I eventually found it roosting along the shoreline with Ringed Plovers where it gave some wonderful views (and what Doughnut had forgotten his camera today?!). It's a female bird sporting assorted leg bling after being ringed in Germany in 2021 and only my second ever sighting of one in the UK after a distant, heat-hazy view of a male at Minsmere in May 1981!

Kentish Plover with Ringed Plovers, 10/1/26 - photo courtesy of @paganbirder on Bluesky

Kentish Plover, 10/1/26 - photo courtesy of @paganbirder on Bluesky

As the tide headed in the Plovers moved closer up the beach towards the sea wall and the Kentish Plover showed beautifully, it was a nervous looking, crouchy bird but it did stay on the beach when most of the Ringed Plovers had flown off until it eventually left too.

Other sightings of note on my visit were 2 Sanderling, Lapwing, Golden Plover, 6 Avocet, Wigeon, Teal, Dunlin, Redshank, Curlew, Oystercatcher, a female Reed Bunting, Linnet and Collared Dove and with the Kentish Plover in the bag and it being such a glorious and calm day I decided to head home and stop off along the way at Dawlish Warren for a walkabout and a look for Divers offshore.

On arriving at Dawlish Warren the sea looked flat calm but there was a little swell which was especially noticeable further out as birds on the sea bobbed up and down and disappeared and then reappeared. I scanned about from the Lifeguard Hut and there were good numbers of Great Crested Grebe scattered across the Bay, most were further out with just a few closer in. Eventually I found some Divers with at least 2 Great Northern Divers and 3 Red-throated Divers seen but they were very mobile and spent little time at the surface. A Guillemot and 3 Common Scoter were also picked up along with a Grey Seal moving west close inshore and at least 2 Common Dolphin moving east distantly offshore.

The View from the Lifeguard Hut towards Exmouth

Dawlish Warren Pronenade towards Exmouth

The water levels were high at the Main Pond but there was a Snipe feeding on the mud amongst the reeds and a female and 2 male Shovelers feeding out on the water. A look at the Estuary from the Dune Ridge revealed the usual birds with a single Grey Plover out on the mudflats bringing my tally of Plover species for the day up to 5. The best though was a Slavonian Grebe in the main river channel, busily diving away and moving upstream, distant but very distinctive in the strong sunshine.

The Main Pond, Dawlish Warren

It was soon time to head back to Plymouth but it had been a very good birding day out and I was very lucky to have seen the Kentish Plover so well and on my first visit too, many birders have had to visit multiple times to eventually catch an often distant sight of it - the Birding Gods certainly smiled on me today.