WILDER SHORES OF SHEPPEY
nother late autumn day dawns at Elmley Nature Reserve and spectral ribbons of mist hang over the ditches and waterways that irrigate this unique coastal marshland habitat. At around 8am, a skein of resident greylag geese, flying in a V-shape, rise up from their watery overnight quarters to go foraging in a field, while large flocks of mallard and pintail ducks bustle about. The 3,200-acre estate, which is both a national nature reserve and a working farm, is on the eastern side of the Isle of Sheppey, where the Thames Estuary meets the English Channel. Overlooking the sheltered Swale Channel and its
