Today I made a trip to Elstree, not to star in a movie at the famous film studios but to collect my camera from the Canon service centre where it was repaired and serviced after a semi-submerging in sea water at Shellness last week. Canon got my camera repaired and cleaned up in just one week and after collecting it I went to the nearby Aldenham Country Park & Reservoir to have a look around and test the camera out. The Country Park is a pleasant place, not huge but a nice mixture of a small reservoir, fringing woodland and pasture, interlaced with drainage ditches and a small stream; a nice rural setting. Given the location and habitat it wasn’t particularly likely that I would see anything unusual but I did see a nice variety of birds and get the chance to test my camera out although a pair of juvenile Shelducks this far inland was a surprise and a migrating Spotted Flycatcher was a nice sighting.On arrival at Aldenham Country Park I went to the lake side where a large group of wildfowl were lazing around at the water’s edge. Canada Geese and Mute Swans are hardly the most exciting birds and either were the many Mallards around but as they were used to humans being nearby they allowed me to get very close giving me some subjects to test the camera on for both photographs and video. More interesting though were a number of Gadwall. This is a species I don’t see agreat deal of so I was surprised to see quite large numbers of them sitting around but perhaps more surprising were two juvenile Common Shelduck. Although this is a common bird, seeing them far away from the coast or river is fairly unusual so they were a pleasant diversion.

The waterside at Aldenham is pretty much standard for a park, full of common species that are used to people but this sort of thing should not be dismissed by birders as it gives a great chance to see these species at close range and for me it was nice to see some local kids getting excited about asking me what I was doing taking photographs of the ducks. They knew the Canada Geese, Swans and Mallards but it was nice to show them the group of Egyptian Geese that were loafing around.

Leaving the “duck pond” environment I took a walk around some of the nice mixed oak woodland patches and other habitats. Many common woodland birds were easily found but anyone who has attempted bird photography will know that just because a bird is common it doesn’t make it easy to get a good shot of it. With this in mind it was nice to get a reasonably good photo of a tiny Goldcrest that I tracked down from its high-pitched call.

Britain’s smallest bird is always hard to photograph as are most small aborial birds, their high levels of activity and the thick foliage make it hard to capture them with a camera. Good numbers of tit flocks at Aldenham gave me plenty of opportunity to watch and photograph Great Tit, Blue Tit and Long-tailed Tit.

Birds like this are mostly overlooked by British birders as they are so common and widespread but I can guarantee that birders from other parts of the world would be very excited to see these colourful and cute little birds.

Anyone who knows me will know that I really enjoy seeing woodpeckers of all species. Although it is a common bird throughout much of its global range I still enjoy Great Spotted Woodpecker and got quite excited when one gave me the opportunity to photograph it. It was making such a noise, hamering against dead trees that it was easy to find.

Along with the small bird flocks were quite a number of Chiffchaffs, busy feeding, putting on weight for their journey south and a nice surprise was a Spotted Flycatcher which seemed to be travelling with them. Nuthatch, Wren and Robin were all nice too but too quick for me and my camera.

Back at the water I found some Black-headed and Lesser Black-bacled Gulls hanging around on a small pier. I know many birders are intimidated or bored by gulls but I like them so took some shots of both adult and juvenile birds.

While watching these birds I heard the distinctive call of a Wigeon. Having not heard them for some time I must admit I wasn’t sure if I had got it wrong but a quick look revealed three birds which seemed quite early for this species to have arrived but given the strong winds a few days earlier they probably got blown in ahead of schedule.

By midday the country park had become quite busy with visitors and I decided to leave to get some lunch. Camera fully functional, a pleasant few hours at a site I would not usually have visited and some nice observations made for a good few hours. Anyone visiting Aldenham Country Park for birding should probably arrive early to avoid the crowds of families that gather here later and remember that the car park costs £4.50.