What a year 2019 has been for me bird-wise! During the year I managed to amass a modest total of 178 species. Here is my birding 2019 as follows: The year started slowly with only a couple of trips down to Rainham Marshes in January - the most interesting birds of note being Ruff , Stonechat and Fieldfare . Believe it or not, a Cetti's warbler was my first lifer of the year! Things started to pick up in the month of February . Despite a fail attempt to see a Blyth's Reed Warbler at Hope Carr nature reserve (believe me we tried), a Green Sandpiper (another lifer) was seen as well as a flyover Goosander . A trip to Pennington Flash after the dip also yielded another lifer - the less common Willow Tit along with some stunning Bullfinches at very close range. March was a particularly good month at Rainham Marshes as I managed 3 patch ticks including 1 lifer. These ticks came in the form of 4 Golden Plover , a flyover Red Kite and even a self found (and somewhat jammy...