Sandwich and West Hythe on a beautiful frosty day | - Click on the image above to view gallery
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 Willow trees I had been keeping my eye on the forecasts and it was clear that today was going to be a lovely sunny, but very cold, day. I had planned on getting out with my camera and a trip to West Hythe where we know there is a Night Heron at the moment is what I had planned. We had actually seen him a few days earlier but the day was so dull I hadn’t any pictures I was happy with.
I do wish I was better at getting up when the alarm goes off at 7.30 but I never am. Once I was with it however and looked out the window to see there was a beautiful hoar frost outside I was quickly dressed and got out as soon as I could. I walked from our house in Sandwich to the quayside and then along the River Stour for a while enjoying the frosty trees and plants covered in the beautiful white crystals. It was still incredibly cold and even when the sun shone on the frosty plants the ice wasn’t melting that quickly.
I could have spent a lot longer enjoying these amazing conditions but there are only so many pictures you can take of the same views and I also really did want to get to West Hythe. So I nipped home, warmed up some home made soup and hot chocolate to take out with me and loaded all my camera gear into my backpack. It’s about a 30 mile drive from home but it didn’t take me that long to get there. The car thermometer never went above 1 degree the whole journey but with the sun shining, I never felt cold all day. I did have plenty of layers on mind, and all my warm clothes.
 Frosty trees  Hoar frost by the river
There is a small car park at West Hythe beside the Royal Military Canal which today was completely frozen over. It’s just a short walk along the path to a sluice gate where the Night Heron is. He’s been in roughly the same spot for a couple of months now. Night Herons are not a native species but one that sometimes finds its way across from the continent.
It was not long before I spotted him sitting by the side of the canal on the branch of a tree, fast asleep with his head out of sight. He sat in this exact position for hours but I thought I’d wait to see if he did something a little more exciting than just sit there. Nearby, by the sluice gate, there was the only stretch of water that wasn’t frozen over and it was here a female Kingfisher was sitting on the branches of the shrubs beside the water and she would occasionally dive into the water emerging every time with a fish in her beak. You can tell it’s a female by the orange part of her lower bill.
It was just lovely watching her while I enjoyed my soup and she must have been well aware of me and other people who were there too but although she would sometimes fly away further upstream she would always return to the same place and when you saw the amount of droppings it’s clearly a favoured spot of hers. I’ve a 300mm lens but being such a small bird it’s not that easy to get that good a shot of her. If only she would come as close as the Robin did once he realised I was eating my lunch. It seems they never miss the chance of a morsel to eat and I never mind sharing it with them of course.
The time seemed to pass very quickly and I realised the sun was getting low in the sky and the Night Heron still hadn’t lifted up its head at all. The clue is in its name though, as they generally feed at night. The one time it lifted its head for a few seconds was when a gull passed overhead with something in its beak and making an almighty racket. I went back to watch the Kingfisher one more time and a few of the other small birds when one of the other people said to me that he’d just seen an animal. He wasn’t sure what it was but pointed in the direction of the sluice gate. I went over to see if I could see anything and was amazed when I saw a Mink.
 Night Heron  Mink
Now Minks are animals you would probably prefer not to see at all as they do so much harm to our native wildlife, but in the cold weather all animals have to take far more risks at finding enough food to survive, so it was a chance to observe this animal closely. In a small area by the drainage pipe there was a part of the water that wasn’t frozen over. Through this hole in the ice the Mink was disappearing, finding fish and bringing them out and leaving them on the surface of the ice. I watched for a short while and in that time he found a fish, a Perch I think, each time he disappeared under the ice. It was possible to see him swimming below the ice. In the end I counted 10 fish left on the surface of the ice, some of them still moving. At one point a dog went a bit close for the Mink’s comfort and the ensuing noise was deafening. Thankfully the dog was put off going any closer.
All this noise did mean the Night Heron was at last awake so at least I managed a few shots of the bird not asleep, but it still had no intention on moving off that perch. By now though the light levels were very low and it was hard to get any real speed on the camera so getting any sharply focused shots of the Mink was not easy no matter what you tried to change on the camera. Our eyes adjust to the light levels in a different way to the cameras sensor so they see things much brighter than they probably are. I thought to myself as it was fast approaching sunset I really must get back to the car so packed up and with one last look beside the sluice gate I saw a Little Egret. These are really shy birds though and he didn’t stick about once he saw me: a shame as it seems there are plenty of fish there and I wasn’t going to do him any harm, I hope he came back when I’d gone.
I walked back along a different canal path to the one I had earlier in the day and came across a tree with some really attractive catkins. I thought I’d have a go at getting a picture in the failing light. I couldn’t believe it when a Robin flew into my shot and sat exactly on the spot I was focussing on.
What a day this turned out to be and one I’ll remember for a long time I’m sure.
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