the Solent & Southampton Water,

Town Quay.

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I spent Friday morning visiting Town Quay and Mayflower Park Southampton. A few large ships were in port. Including the Queen Victoria – One of the Cunard fleet. The liner has a crew of 913 and can accommodate 2,061 passengers.

Red Funnel Ferries – Services run from Town Quay Southampton to Cowes on the Isle of Wight. The ferry takes about an hour and the fast jet passenger service takes just under 30 minutes.

I set my camera on the ground scattered some bird seeds – pressed record and waited.

A surprise sighting was a lone Giullemott fishing off the end of Town Quay. A bird I have seen often along our coasts but only in areas where there are stretches of steep cliffs. Considered a common bird and found in large breeding colonies. They come to land only to nest, spending the rest of their lives at sea.

Season arrivals.

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Here on the Solent, almost all the Terns and summer visitors have gone for the winter. It was a very poor year for Tern numbers. I think this was due to the bird flu outbreak we had and the height of the breeding season. The black-headed gulls which are with us all-year numbers also remain low following the bird flu.

Soon the Brent Geese will be arriving in large numbers from Siberia, I have only seen a few so far this year. Sanderling numbers and Ring Plover numbers are increasing with the arrival of the cooler months. Taking advantage of a bright rain-free morning it was a pleasure to watch these little birds fly in while sitting on the beach.

Hovercraft.

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The “hovercraft” is a word and an invention that Christopher Cockerell patented in 1954 after working for Marconi, where he helped with work on early radar. Aware of the Normandy landings on D-Day he thought about how to get troops ashore and up a beach he came up with the “hovercraft”. By 1955, he had a working prototype and pursued a patent for his creation, he obtained a patent in 1956.

In that year, he demonstrated his prototype craft, which used air blown out of the bottom of the craft under pressure, to British authorities and showed that it was possible to enable such a vehicle to glide easily over water and land, even mud and marshes.

 Saunders-Roe here on the Solent on The Isle of Wight built the SR-N1 which was launched on June 11, 1959, and later that year crossed the English Channel from Dover, England to Calais, France. Although only used for one public service from Portsmouth and Isle of Wight now in the UK they are a regular sight on The Solent.

A visit to our local Hovercraft Museum last year in my post below.

In the Hover.

Sir Christopher Cockerell lived from the 1960 in village of Hythe on Southampton Water. I met him in 1980’s . A Blue Plaque to commemorate Sir Christopher Cockerell and the Grove building, the home of hovercraft development way put up in Hythe in 2022.

Hovercraft filmed on the Solent yesterday.

Re-birth.

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As part of the UKs defences against the French work on the construction of Fort Gilkicker commenced in 1863 and took eight years to complete. The finished fort provides a semi-circular firing arc from 22 gun placements, over the eastern end of Stokes Bay at Gosport.

Today we walked out to Fort Gilkicker. The redevelopment of the site is underway. The current planning permission is for Gilkicker to be restored and converted into 22 townhouses in the gun casemates plus four flats in the former barracks. Estimates of the cost of doing this are between £15 and £20 million. The site was bought for £1,386,000. Given the sums of money to restore/save this Historical Fort such a project could only be undertaken by a commercial redevelopment. Within the plans I understand one of the outer buildings will be made into a cafe with historical displays about the fort.

below some older posts on Fort Gilkcker.

Fort Gilkicker
Walk to Fort Gilkicker.

The original gun firing positions were blocked before World War One up and the outer walls were further strengthened with substantial earthwork embankments with the redevelopment this is being removed and the original casements are be revealed.

Above 2020 below 2023

Changing fortunes.

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Bird flu (avian influenza) has devastated the Black-headed gull colony at Titchfield Haven National Nature Reserve this year. My estimate is gull numbers are reduced by some 75%. The Common Terns failed to arrive in any numbers. Larger Gull – such as Herring Gulls, Great and Lesser Black-backed Gulls number are fewer. So this has given Avocets space to build their nests and without predators, the Avocet chicks get a head start.

A pair of Avocets mate.