Shoreline site guide (ii): Otterham Creek to Lower Halstow

Sometimes a sunset behind you can help confirm that the estuary really
is a mix of mud and sand (Ham Ooze, July 2015)

If you look at a map, this is just a very short section of the shore. It will have just two walks described (that can easily be treated as one). But it needs a page to itself to allow a detailed guide to the main island complex just offshore along this stretch, described in the hope of allowing visiting birders to record their sightings and counts that little bit more easily.

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Walk Six:
Otterham Creek to Shoregate Creek

Intro: 

"Not far along is Otterham Quay with a little coaster terminal at the head of the creek, and on the other side are orchards which used to be full of cherry trees. This fruit... seems to present modern growers with many difficulties, so large numbers have been turned over to growing Conference pears. Many of these are on the peninsula that juts out into the estuary, the centre of which is the village of Upchurch on a small hill. Across the fields one can reach Lower Halstow, but I walked to Ham Green among the orchards and then along the saltings of Twinney Creek..."
'Portrait of the River Medway', Roger Penn, 1981

"The Wryneck or 'Snakebird' wakes us up early in the spring with its peculiar note, even earlier than the Chiffchaff; the latter frequents the woods and coppices, the former our orchards and homesteads, and enlivens us at once with its familiar presence..."

'Notes on the Birds of Rainham, including the district between Chatham and Sittingbourne', Walter Prentis 1894

The wedge that is Ham Green divides the Medway's southern intertidal zone into two distinct estuarine basins, and sees you begin to leave behind the urban sprawl of the Medway Towns. Very few birders explore the backroads here as views to the marshes are limited; however, the route does give a good flavour of orchard birding.  

The England Coast Path, delayed in the main by Covid restrictions, should have been open by now to help avoid stretches on busy rat run between Sheppey and the Medway Towns; until then, be especially careful on any stretch of footpath that takes a road route between Rainham and Upchurch.

 

Details:
Map reference: TQ831670   
What3words: comply.cycle.cover
Distance: Circular route: 6 km (out to Shoregate and back a further 900 metres.
Time: Allow three hours, four if visiting Shoregate.
Open: at all times- public footpath route.
Parking: Park sensibly in residential roads off Otterham Quay Lane south of the starting point.
Nearest train station: Rainham, 1.75 km
Toilets/restaurant facilities: Public house- The Brown Jug, Upchurch.

The route:
(This walk is described as I would normally take it, you may of course start from any of the points described.)

Just north of the entrance to Otterham Quay Wharf (A) and the Beckenham mobile home park is a the footpath up onto Windmill Hill. Behind Mill House you enter an Orchard. Note the farmer has let the diagonal footpath slip somewhat, preferring to encourage walkers out of the crop to skirt around the field edge. The is actually beneficial to birding. By staying to the western side of the orchard (B) there are distant views down on to part of Horsham Marsh, the head of Otterham Creek (Otterham Fairway), Motney Hill sewage farm reedbed and Bayford Marsh. The adjacent apple orchard can be excellent for winter thrushes and finches whilst windfall remains.

Make your way for the north-east corner of the orchard and walk east along Horsham Lane. As you reach the Brown Jug public house the kerbside path disappears for much of the next 650 metres; please take extra care here. As Horsham Lane begins to climb up the hill into Upchurch, look for a footpath to the north-east partly hidden in a high conifer hedge not far past Horsham Manor Farm (C). Traffic can be particularly bad here as the entrance is on a tight bend of the narrow road. The new Coast Path will eventually provide a safer route.

The path is now a rough track where, after some 175 metres, where one field has become a car storage area, fair but fading 'scope views down onto Horsham Marsh can be had (D). Over my nine years of walking the path views have become glimpses thanks to tree/ hedge growth, but come winter there are (slightly) better opportunities to scan the distant wildfowl.

2013/ 2021. The 'scope views then...

...the 'bins view now (above, 'scopes below).

(Vehicles/kit on marsh relate to ongoing waste pipe replacement SWA,
which should be finished during winter '21/'22)

Next, the path skirts Horsham fishing lakes (E) before passing through a poplar hedgerow to cross a large open field to Poot Lane (F). Horsham Marsh continues on your left, where a sizeable complex of wet ditches and fields are well worth another scan.

Turn north (left) on Poot Lane. The large mature hedges along next 200 metres of (narrow) road often hold fair numbers of small birds, skirting higher ground, especially in early autumn. 

You now have a choice of two routes to Shoregate. I tend to use one out, one back.

To Shoregate by road:
Continue along Poot Lane (G). To your left there are several more views out over Horsham and Bayford marshes. You also pass a small pond with a reed bed where there is a Jackdaw colony in the trees behind. The road eventually turns east to run between orchards on both sides. Stay on the as it turns south again until you pick up the staggered Saxon Shore way footpath where it crosses the road just past Ham Green Farmyard, at Shoregate Lane.

To Shoregate by footpath:
Opposite the first bungalows on your left the path cuts north-east (H), first through recently developed paddocks then, after a dog leg through a horse exercise yard, some of the older orchards left at Ham Green. The path reaches Poot Lane where the start of Shoregate Lane is about 30 metres or so to your right.

Both road and footpath routes have now converged at Ham Green (J). Continue east along Shoregate Lane to the gates of Shoregate Wharf, and the footpath turns south to rejoin the sea wall. It is easy to continue to Lower Halstow, but this will be described in the next walk as I make Shoregate a circular walk from home in Rainham.

Ham Green's 'green'

My purpose for the walk is to view covering tides over Ham Ooze. Timings are tight to count both Lower Halstow and Ham Ooze on the same tide. The Ooze is the most important low tide feeding area for the eastern basin. Try to time your arrival for between 1.5 and 2.5 metres on a rising tide, you can have a good hour's watch of the to-ings and fro-ings of the large numbers of waders and wildfowl.

Expect:
Winter: Thrushes and finches feature heavily in and around the orchards, whilst scrubby areas/ game farm cover strips attract many finches and buntings.

Spring: Orchards great for Green Woodpecker and Little Owl. Grey Partridge often in fields adjacent to Poot Lane.

Summer: Hedgerow warblers, distant breeding waders flighting over the marsh.

Autumn: A fair volume of visible migration over/from Windmill Hill, including small nos. of waders moving on overland at dusk (or around tidal covering)
 

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Walk Seven:
The Brickfields to Shoregate Creek

Intro: 

The inclosure of Greenborough, Slayhills and Millfordhope, by way of new sea walls to create premium grazing land, was financed by a Mr. George Webb in 1878, and took five years' to complete. The sea walls were soon breached by floods in 1897, but were repaired. However, the flood of New Year's Eve, 1904, caused much more considerable damage, and the islands surrendered to the tides.

Today, on a spring tide, little land escapes the waters and we are left with just the tops of Mr Webb's walls.

And with south-east England continuing to sink a centimetre a year, and threatened tidal rise from climate collapse, even those tops have just a few short years left. Come see the islands while you can.

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Ohhh this walk hurts my OCD. Although the whole journey along the southern shore of the estuary is west to east, after much gnashing of teeth I decide this walk is best described going in the opposite direction, mainly as the starting point for 99% of visiting birders will be in the village of Lower Halstow. Most arrive by car, but there is no easy parking out on Ham Green, especially with the amount of farm machinery using the lanes, so Lower Halstow is the starting point for many birders. Most are satisfied with the first kilometre's birding, but there is much more to see, especially the views to the Medway's famous islands.

Details:
Map reference: TQ859674   
What3words: contracting.nowadays.silver
Distance: Straight return route: 4.75 km.
Time: Allow three hours.
Open: at all times- public footpath route.
Parking: Park sensibly in Lapwing Drive in Lower Halstow village.
Nearest train station: Rainham, 2.6 km
Toilets/restaurant facilities: None on route. Nearest public house in village: The Three Tuns

The route:

At very end of Lapwing Drive is the Parish Council's sign for The Old Brickfields (A). Go through the gate, keeping Halstow Creek to your right. You are alongside Halstow Creek. At low tide this holds a ribbon of water close to the far sea wall of Barksore. Walk north until the path (and wall) turn west. If any of the mud is uncovered, you will be able to make out the remains of an old causeway, the Winkle Path. This is the boundary between Twinney and Halstow creeks.

How to describe Halstow Creek? It ends just beyond the small rump of an island some 1.8 km north of you, where Twinney Creek joins and both immediately merge into Stangate Creek. The island is Gull island. Fast disappearing, this was once the site of a colony many years before the gulls moved from the northern saltings to the main island complex. Nowadays a loafing site for Herring Gulls, Cormorants and Herons, the island is a good marker for any counts/directions to fellow birders. And often 'target species' can be found here; at low tide the much deeper Stangate keeps enough water to hold winter grebes and duck just out of sight behind Barksore. On the rise the target species drift back in, often first picked up out and around Gull Island.

Halstow creek approaches flood at about the 2.4 metre mark, so a watch during the hour running up to this time will give you time to work through the numbers present (many waders and wildfowl that had been feeding out on Ham Ooze will make for these mudflats for a final feed).

Continue west along the wall until a reed bed appears (B). Looking offshore again, you now are at the head of Twinney Creek. This freshwater feed is extremely popular first thing in the morning with the Brent Geese. This Creek runs fractionally later than Halstow Creek, and around the 2.4 metre mark waders begin to cross from Halstow to Twinney. The vast majority of any wildfowl remain around Halstow Creek, then tend to flight towards the offshore island of Millfordhope, or the waters just north of Twinney Saltings. These saltings can act a wader roost on neap tides, but even then hit and miss as birds are easily spooked by walkers. Continue north.

The open fields of Frog farm (C) are a draw to Brent Geese in winter, and has been one of the best spots to pick up fellow travelling Black Brants when about. However, the birds are extremely suspicious of tripods and people who stop to stare (this is a heavily shot estuary) so high levels of fieldcraft are needed to avoid sending the birds back out to the islands.

As you reach the saltings you are at one of the closest points to the island known as Milfordhope Marsh. The string of small islets running back to the wharf are the remnants of the old 'strayway' (a track) out to the island known as Milfordhope saltings. This stretch of mudflats south of the saltings/island is one of the last areas to go under on the flood and often attracts the Knot in Jan-Feb; a great spot to see the birds wheeling.

There is now a copse on your left, currently an outdoor wedding venue (D). Sadly this meant the loss of much of its ornithological interest, with ground cover cleared and the Egret roost no more, but in the autumn there is still the chance of a chat or a flycatcher popping up around the sunnier edges.

After passing the houseboats at Twinney Wharf, continue west, then north, skirting the extensive section of Twinney Saltings. If watched through the rise of a spring tide in autumn/winter, good numbers of Snipe will be flushed out as the area covers; it is a safe day roost for them.

The path continues north to a wooden footbridge (E) and on through a small boatyard. For a while the seawall is no more, and you have a feel of what the shoreline must have once been. Scan east and there are distant views to the head of Stangate Creek, an east-west dog-leg and beyond to a main roost site at Chetney Hill/Canal. This is best opportunity to 'scope those interesting ducks or grebes loitering in Stangate at low tide. It is hard birding, but the best counts of Goldeneye and Megransers are to be had from here.

A little further north on the path and the 'rear' of Millfordhope gives way to another curving finger of the Stangate complex- Millfordhope Creek. This is the major route for waders and wildfowl moving to/from the open feeding grounds of Ham Ooze, and when disturbance dictates, for many of the birds that have been out mid-river around the likes of Bishop Ooze which might have chosen the western basin for roosting.

Just north is a slender dividing line of of saltings between here and the southern edge of Ham Ooze/Hamgreen Saltings- the narrow remnants of Slayhills Saltings. This was once the main track out to the northern islands when they were inhabited- and you may even glimpse a hardy wildfowlers making their way out to the islands. No birder should ever be tempted to try this.

As you get nearer to Shoregate Creek (F) and Wharf, the higher ground beyond Slayhills Saltings are the Slayhills themselves. Simplistically, they are the western half of a large island complex, the more distant eastern section being Greenborough. The dividing waters are always hidden from sea wall view. If you look out and have a raptor as close as Millfordhope, then you can record as being Slayhills. Anything flighting further east is Greenborough (and any speck out over a higher sea wall beyond that is off over Chetney Marshes).

The walk ends at Shoregate wharf. Hamgreen saltings are mostly hidden beyond, but the expanse of Ham Ooze is clear.

(A bird's-eye view of the offshore areas mentioned in the walk)

If the tide is out, it is worth looking north of Slayhills saltings to a building body of water running alongside Slayhills Marsh. This is Ham Creek. Good numbers of wildfowl gather here, and waders can pre-roost on Slayhills.

Ham Creek turns into Sharfleet Creek, the channel south of the final main island here, Burntwick. Distances are now eye-straining from shore, but flights are easy enough to work out.

Mention should be made of the old tall metal channel marker, No. 7, sat out on the Ooze. The best Osprey post on the southern shore in the autumn. Ham Ooze is a huge shallow bay at the start of the flood, and easy fishing. One other marker remains here, out on Slayhills/Greenborough, No 8. Looking towards that at dusk, an area with a very flat stretch of skyline, is one of the easiest ways to pick up raptors coming to roost.

From Shoregate Wharf, looking out north to the river, the first body of water at low tide is the northernmost end of Half Acre, with the mud of Bishop Spit (the tip of Bishop Ooze) beyond. Just past where the spit ends, the main channel of Long Reach becomes Kethole Reach. If there are any interesting ducks or grebe to pick up, they will usually have been in the quieter waters of Half Acre over low tide. Most will not come in with the tide over the flats, but drift towards the western basin. However, disturbance may make them change minds for a few days, when double figure counts of Merganser  occur. Divers tend to be more out towards Kethole, but will come in towards the islands. The most common species here is Great Northern.

Any lost waifs and strays on an autumn blow will tend to circuit Half Acre/Long Reach/Kethole, with gulls sometimes heading upriver/inland, skuas turning back out east towards Sheerness. Sadly there is no good sheltered seawatching spot, you just have to hunker down below the sea wall.

You now retrace your steps to Lower Halstow.

The Old Brickfields, the area of scrub and reedbed close to the village, is well worth exploring. In the past decade the local 'Friends' group have carried out a lot of work to open paths through the scrub, so footfall has increased and the area not so great for large winter roosts as once was, but there is still enough scrubland to attract passerines, and whilst Willow Warbler and Turtle Dove have been lost as breeders in my time back on the Medway, one or two pairs of Nightingale do hang on.

Expect:
Winter: Large movements of wildfowl and waders between Ham Ooze and the islands. Evening roosts in the Brickfields; some winter thrushes, with many more flights moving to larger sites south of the village. The reedbed acts as a roost for smaller birds such as Reed Bunting.

Spring: Nightingale in the Brickfields. Common summer visitors. Small volumes of spring passage migrants. The Winkle Path is of best sites for loafing Mediterranean Gulls just offshore. 

Summer: Breeding gulls and terns from the islands are busy nesting. Local House Martins gather mud at Lower Halstow wharf.

Autumn: Visible migration cutting through from direction of Barksore. Falls around the seawall (smaller copses are easiest to work). In first half of autumn, the biggest numbers of wildfowl are to be found out at Ham Ooze. The Ooze is also the best site on the southern shore for Osprey (check No 7 marker).