Church Day

The local vicar is a Selsey Birder and we kept meaning to start the kids back at Children's Church so we got our acts together today and took them to St. Peter's in Selsey. I attended the Eucharist while waiting for them and Andy the Vicar Birder (and finder of the Nighthawk!) delivered a really nice service- first time I've been to church in years. 

After church we got a picnic from East Wittering and went to East Head for a picnic and walk. The walk was interupted by a few decent birds including 16 Whimbrel, 5 Golden Plovers, 3 Wheatear and a Yellow Wagtail over. Full list HERE.

So clearly a few bits still on the move and elsewhere on the Peninsula today the Woodchat was still present and joined by a Whinchat and there was also a Cuckoo, Black Redstart and the first Swift around.

The temperatures dropped last night in the clear conditions with a northerly airflow but there was still a few moth migrants. 

Golden Plovers (above) in various stages of summer plumage and Grey Plover (below) that hasn't even bothered moulting a single feather yet. Most of the Grey Plovers in the harbour are still in 'winter' plumage so presumably has a different moult strategy to Golden Plovers. 

Whimbrels. Good numbers seem to build up at East Head in Spring. 

Male Wheatear- two males and a female today

Small Mottled Willows- three in one trap is probably a record if I remember right. The mild evenings this week have produced quite a bit of moth migration (and bird migration) across the country with a pretty good influx of Small Mottled Willows. 

Least Black Arches - NFY now on 58 for the year

Common Quaker- they will be over soon so thought I would honour this species with a blog pic before I see them again next spring- often the very first sign of spring so always welcome to see again. Also on the church theme today the Common Quaker was named after the relegious group The Quakers for reasons I can't recall now but something to do with the colour of the moth and the garments the Quakers wore.  

Woodchat Shrike and Hoopoe!

The writing was on the wall with the news of two Black-winged Stilts at Pulborough early morning so I went over to check Ferry and the Tramway for any overshoots. 74 species in about 2 hours HERE did not include any overshoots with highlights including 5 Wheatears, 1 Common Sandpiper and 3 LRP on Ferry and plenty of warblers including Willow Warblers and Lesser Whitethroat. There was also a singing Corn Bunting in the Long Pool field which is an unusual record for there. 

I then decided to go home to get on with family weekend stuff and within minutes news broke of a Woodchat Shrike at Pagham Rife found by Jim Weston. I headed over there and was soon enjoying cracking views of a fine male Woodchat Shrike with Marc, Andrew, Bart, Adam and Courtney. There was also Little Ringed Plover and Wheatear in the the same field. 

Before I met up with Holly and the kids at Runcton Cafe I had a quick look at Pagham Spit for any more Wheatears- no more Wheatears but 7 Little Terns fying around and 6 Whimbrel out in the harbour. 

Later in the day Ian called to ask if I wanted to join him in going back to see the Woodchat (he hadn't seen it yet as he had been at football) so we walked from Halseys across the fields to Pagham Rife. The Woodchat was still there now with 3 Little Ringed Plovers and a Wheatear. On the way back we tracked via Owl Point Field where a male Whinchat and 5 Wheatears had been found early on in the day. That was now 11 Wheatears I had seen today and there were a further 5 at the Windmill, 7 at Medmerry and 4 at the Bill seen by others so at least 29 on the Peninsula today (there were 100 at Portland). What with the 3 Little Rings at Ferry and Pagham Rife that was 6 today with another from Medmerry, also a good spring count. All the news from today HERE. 

As Ian and I were walking past Halseys, a Hoopoe started calling. Immediately I said to Ian is that your phone ring tone? It's a Hoopoe. He said no it wasn't and the bird carried on calling again. We went round the back of the wood to see if any other birders had been playing the call but there was nobody there so we put the news out. We both had to get home but looked for it for about 20 minutes and then Andrew and Bart arrived so we left them in the area so hopefully its pinned down. My Hoopoe jink has finally lifted although I still haven't seen one, so not fully lifted yet. 

Woodchat and Hoopoe are both Peninsula lifers for me and the Whinchat also a Peninsula year tick. Now on 210 for my Peninsula list and 154 for the year list. An excellent day! It was a light NW wind today and I wasn't expecting much in the 'worst wind' but it was very light, almost calm and a high pressure which must have facilitated the overshooting birds. Still very much a surprise and proves you don't need a tail wind for birds to overshoot- they will even overshoot in a light headwind as proven today.  

Presumed adult male (?) Woodchat Shrike (above) The first on the Peninsula since 2007. The ageing and sexing of Woodchats is problematic with all birds undergoing a near complete winter moult. Overall males have a darker red-brown crown and upper mantle, jet black feather tracts and less white around the eye than a female. On this bird there is quite a bit of white around the eye and the feather tracts have a bit of brown tinge on the remiges but look more jet black on the mantle so it's not straight forward. The bird wasn't singing and males often sing on passage. However overall the deep red crown colouration and the presence of jet black feather tracts suggests a male but this appears less obvious in some recent better pics HERE so for me the jury is still out. Various texts say sexing is sometimes only possible when male and females are together and some lone birds are very difficult to sex.  In terms of age as all birds have an extensive to complete winter moult it is the presence of a moult contrast that can age birds (so the brown tinge in the remiges doesn't imply an age related feature)  and there doesn't seem to be any contrast so suggests an adult bird. Finally there are three races of Woodchats, nominate senator in Europe to Turkey, badius in the Balearics and niloticus in the Middle East. Badius lack the white primary patch and niloticus has a yet black mask, a very extensive white primary patch and pale at the bases of the rectrices. Neither of these suite of features are present on this bird and it appears a typical senator. *

Male Wheatear- a nice fall of these today 

Whimbrel- a small arrival in the harbour today with 2 in the Ferry Channel and 6 out in the harbour 

Singing Corn Bunting at Long Pool field 

Dunlins in summer plumage at Pagham Spit 

The moth trap was also lively last night with highlight this Puss Moth (above) and Mullein (below). Also NFYs included Iron and Pebble Prominet, Ruby Tiger, Sharp-angled Peacock and Dark Spectacle. Now on 57 for the year. 

*Sources: Handbook of Western Palearctic Birds, ID Handbook of European Birds and Collins Guide 

Migrant Uptick

There was a little bit of moth migration last night and also a few bird migrants around the garden this morning HERE. After getting a bit of work done (it was supposed to be a work day) I had a quick look round Ferry, Long Pool and the Tramway and indeed there were a few migrants around there too HERE.

Highlights included a nice flock of mixed hirundines at the back of Ferry, 3 Whimbrel in Ferry Channel, seemingly more waders in the harbour and back at the garden there was Sand Martin, House Martin and Barn Swallow and Blackcap, Chiffchaff, Willow Warbler and Whitethroat. Also 4 Golden Plover flew over- the first I’ve seen in a while locally. 

Grey Plovers, Barwit , Knots and Dunlins over the harbour

Small Mottled Willow- had two of these (NFYs) and other migrants included Dark Sword Grass and Angle Shades  

Brindled Beauty was a NFY

Seraphim (another NFY). Also had Brimstone, Muslin moth, Flame Shoulder as NFYs so now on 50 species for the year.  The garden all time list is 632 moth species and an additional 19 butterflies. So far I've added 3 new species this year but hopefully as summer approaches that will start climbing quickly.  

Coastal Buff, Agonopterix yeatina

Dark Sword Grass

A Slow Day

The predicted southeast winds failed to materialise and prevailing conditions indeed prevailed with a southwest wind and frontal conditions that had moved through by the afternoon. I had planned to go birding today so stuck to the plan and checked out Ferry, Long Pool and the Tramway HERE. Not much different to previous days with highlights including the summer plumage Spotted Redshank, 2 Little Ringed Plover, plenty of singing warblers including Willow Warbler and a showy Water Rail. Shoveler numbers are down further as were Blackwit numbers. 

I then went back to the lodge and did some paperwork and work in the garden before a visit to Church Norton to time with the high tide and a chance to pick up the terns. The plan worked out with Little Tern and Common Tern sat out on the mud amongst the 250+ Sandwich Tern HERE. There was also a Whimbrel, couple of Willow Warblers singing and a male Wheatear on the spit. The terns put me on 151 for the local year list. 

The night temperatures were mild so I put the trap out and had a couple of migrants. Again all pretty slow going. 

On another slow moving front, also been keeping an eye out for any new pan-species ticks for the garden and recently added Great Silver Water Beetle (moth trap by-catch) and a couple of spiders including Common Sheetweb Spider and Common Stretch Spider. Now on 191 species HERE. 

A good way to get some sense of speed when things are going slow is to flit around the front lines of lots of different slow moving fronts. That's basically what I did today to get some sense of being productive. The weather forecast isn't great for birding either although there were some north easterlies on the horizon which can be good for sea watching this time of year.  

Little, Common and Sandwich Terns 

Spotted Redshank and Redshank on Ferry 

Sedge Warbler 

Silver-Y. The first for the year. Also Angle Shades and a presumed Tuta absoluta (retained for dissection). Also had the first Cinnabar for the year. Only on 41 species this year so far. 

The front garden ditch is coming on nicely with some lush vegetation creating some nice insect habitat

The fruit hedges we planted last year are coming along nicely 

On the food growing front we've got Spinach, carrots and Rhurbarb ready for harvesting at the moment and got Tomatoes, Peppers and Sweetcorn in the green house to go out later and potatoes are in already. Meanwhile the perennial fruits- berries and strawberries survived the winter well and seem well established. The garlic (above) also got through the winter well. Still need to replace the birds after the fox attacks. 

We've been putting our nettles to use. An attempt at creating a plant food (above) that I saw on the internet and good old nettle soup (below). After 18 months I've also started using the compost that we started when we first got here- its not quite ready but good enough to go. 

Summer visitor build up

Kids were back to school today so it was back to Mondays in the field. I started off at the Bill which was very quiet HERE. The highlight was four House Martins coming in (maybe local birds). 

I then did Ferry and the Tramway area HERE with highlights including Lesser Whitethroat, 3 Willow Warblers and Whitethroats building up with 9 singing males and also 10 Blackcaps and 9 Chiffchaffs. There was also Whimbrel , 2 Little Rings on Ferry and also 37 Blackwits and 7 Avocets there. 

Next it was over to Medmerry HERE where there was a similar theme of a nice build up of summer visitors with 2 Common Sandpipers, 2 Sedge and 1 Reed Warbler, 3 Chiffs, 3 Blackcaps, 17 Whitethroats, 3 Barn Swallow and a Wheatear. There was also 3 singing male Dartford Warblers and a singing male Stonechat. 

After lunch I went over to Church Norton to try and get the Little and Common Terns that are around but the tide was out and the birds were out of view. Highlight was a couple of Whimbrel HERE. There was also an Osprey over the harbour today which headed north after catching a mid-migration meal. 

House Martin, Lesser Whitethroat, Dartford Warbler and Common Sandpiper were Peninsula year ticks so now on 149 and the Lesser White and Dartford were also world year ticks- now on 827. 

2nd year Marsh Harrier (above with Blackwits) and below over Ferry

Avocet and Little Ring on Ferry

Common Sandpiper at Medmerry

Whimbrel at Church Norton

Whitethroat 

Stonechat (above) and Dartford Warbler (below) at Medmerry . With both species singing there was a real Heathland like feel there today

Weekend Round-up

A westerly airflow resumed on Friday which has slowed things down a bit locally which was fortunate as the Easter holidays were still playing out so not much time to get out. My Dad visited at the end of the week so we had a day at Arundel HERE where the birding highlight was a singing Nightingale along the Mill Stream boundary and good numbers of Sand Martins and some nice Mandarins on the river. 

We also had a couple of trips to the beach at West Wittering- nothing much to report there apart from about 100 Sanderlings still around.

On Friday morning Isaac woke me up at 4am and I had a lot of work to catch up with so I decided to make a start and when I went out to the garden office to sort out the animals a Cetti's Warbler was singing from the lane- only the second time I've had them in the garden. It was doing a sub-song and considering it was completely dark at first I thought it might be a Nightingale but Cetti's is still good for the garden. 

A couple of birding sessions in the garden recently HERE and HERE has produced between 34-37 species of 124- 141 indiviudals with highlights including a pair of Peregrine low over the garden,  the six Shelducks still hanging around the fields, Med Gulls regularly going over calling, a Willow Warbler singing, a couple of Chiffchaffs, Blackcap, a Barn Swallow, singing Skylark and the Cetti's Warbler. .  

The moth trap has been pretty quiet as night temperatures have dropped again and despite several efforts during a small period of moth migration (mainly out further west) the only sniff of a migrant has been a single Angle Shades. 

On the Peninusla Cuckoo has arrived, the Vicar had a Great Egret, Little Rings are hanging around the Ferry (although the field is drying out fast), the first Whimbrels and a Little Tern are in the harbour, a Bonxie is hanging around the Bill and a few Common Scoters and other bits are trickling past the Bill.

So pretty slow, looks like warmer air is back on Tuesday and Wednesday so fingers crossed. 

Sand Martin

Mandarin

Whitethroat- all the ones I've seen so far have not being doing the full song 

Moorhen- I started seeing the first Mallard and Moorhen chicks last week

A couple of free flying Cackling Geese (Ridgeways's) were out with the Greylags and Canadas on the Mill Stream Fields at Arundel 

Warblers pour in

The wind remains from the east but it was much lighter with day temperatures yesterday (8th April) reaching about 18 C by the afternoon. As it seemed like good arrival conditions I got up early before easter family stuff and walked from Halseys to Pagham Spit and then back through Honer fields. 81 species of just over 1000 individuals HERE, There had indeed been a large arrival of migrants with a male Wheatear, 10 Sedge Warbler, 4 Reed Warblers, 3 Whitethroats, 2 Willow Warblers, 21 Chiffchaffs, 2 Barn Swallow and a few Mipits going over. The Spotted Redshank was also still in White's creek (presumably a different bird to the Ferry Channel bird). Elsewhere on the Peninsula other birders recorded Little Terns, Lesser Whitethroat, House and Sand Martins, more Wheatears and a Barnacle Goose flew east with a few Brents HERE. 

The tern and gull colony at Norton was busy with over 100 Sandwich Terns and Black-headed and Med Gulls. Little and Cattle Egrets and Grey Herons were on nests in the Owl Copse colony.

Waterbirds in the harbour had more less emptied out since my last visit HERE wuth harbour populations roughly down by half from 2000 to 1000 birds over the last couple of weeks (down from 13,000 at peak winter counts). I only had 4 Wigeon, 15 Teal and no Pintails. Brent Geese were down to 2 birds. Shoveler numbers were also down to about 15 birds (mainly on Ferry). Shelduck numbers are holding up (there were even six birds in the field opposite our house). Wader numbers were right down to 80 Dunlin, 10 Knot, 30 Grey Plover and a single Lapwing. 3 Barwits included a nice summer plumage male. I'm capturing my personal data on the Pagham Harbour RSPB and LNR- Pagham Harbour area Ebird hotspot (the more people that use a single hotspot the better the overall big picture for the harbour) with the bar charts for this year capturing some of the major trends HERE.

The species diversity is maintained at around 80 species with the arrival of the summer migrants. My personal local year list now on 145. 

The night temperatures held up to around 10 C so I put the moth trap out with the best night this year for diversity with 17 species of about 40 individuals. Also the first migrants of the year- a couple of Rusty-dots. The moth year list is now on 37 species. 

Male Wheatear- quite a peachy uniform wash to the underparts so possibly a Greenland/Northern bird

The last Brents in the harbour 

Tawny Pinion -Seems like a finally got these two right with the dark thorax of Tawny (above) seperating it from Pale (below), approved by the CMR. 

Pale Pinion

Nut-tree Tussock

Lunar Marbled Brown 

Pale Prominent

Powdered Quaker

Chocolate-tip