22nd November - a nice sunny morning with little wind, but a little cold. The lake and spit didn't hold anything new, so I wandered down to the riverside meadows. The cattle were standing around on the footpath looking like they were trying to warm up, so not wanting to disturb them, I scanned westwards to see if there were any geese, as there usually are, and maybe something interesting in with them. No geese at all, but quite a few corvids. A Buzzard flew over them low north and was immediately mobbed and amongst these was a Raven, which briefly took to the air and then landed again just out of view beyond the fence line. Being a year tick and a relatively scarce bird here, I decided a closer approach was called for, so marched across the field to the area fenced off by the STW - a spill earlier in the year, which I'm not sure has been fixed yet, but has been fenced off for months. As I arrived at the fencing, the Raven took to the air and flew westwards directly over me - it didn't call, but continued southwards over the Thames and into Berks at Cock Marsh where it flew ever eastwards and out of view - a nice year tick and unusual to actually see on the ground rather than just passing over.
Returning to the lake, a sudden exodus of birds from the spit hailed the arrival of a Peregrine that flew low over the birds, though without much purpose and then flew off northwards - only my second sighting this year.
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