Slow Indian Summer Days

The high pressure conditions continue as does the quiet spell for migration. There was very little going over the garden this morning and a check on the falling tide at White's Creek and East Side produced very little new apart from a few more ducks HERE. Red Kite, 2 Peregrine and a Marsh Harrier were the highlights and 4 Avocet and 11 Golden Plover were the first time I've seen these on this side of the harbour this autumn. There was only 5 Dunlin and I didn't see any Ringed Plovers so not much hope in finding something amongst the small waders. 

The moth trap was also quiet with little in the way of insect migration despite the southerly airflow. A deep southerly airflow is forecast for next week so hopefully a change in weather will kick start migration again. 

Hopefully something will happen round here as it looks like I'm local bound for a while as I've run out of money following a very quiet six months at work so the autumn birding war chest is empty after forking out for a half term week in Bulgaria with the family and then the big trip to Namibia in November.  

Pintail numbers were up to 28 and Wigeon up to 67 with 6 Shoveler and 177 Teal. Pintail and Wigeon (above and below). The male Pintails are moulting into winter plumage with some showing darker heads. Will be interesting to see how the winter population of Pintail build to the expected 200 or so wintering birds  HERE. 

Golden Plovers on East Side. The first Brent was in the harbour yesterday. 

Cypress Pug- a NFY

Vestal- they keep coming with 5 last night . Other 'migrants' recently have included a couple of Small Mottled Willow, single Portland Ribbon Wave and Blair's Mocha and the odd Delicate and Rusty-dot with a few Rush Veneers. 

Deep Brown Dart. Surprisingly it looks like this is a first for the garden with few records in this area HERE. They have been common at my previous haunts. Now on 720 for the garden and 547 for the year. 

A day at home

I had a load of paperwork to do today so decided to stay at the lodge and squeeze in a bit of garden birding. 42 species in and from the garden HERE with highlights including a female-type Marsh Harrier flying high to the east, the first Firecrest for the garden autumn and a few Chiffchaffs and Blackcaps. The early morning vis-mig was pretty disappointing with very few hirundines and small numbers of Mipits.

The moth trap was also a bit dissappointing but it was a clear night with a bright moon. Highlights included Pink-barred Sallow (NFY) and also Sallow and Centre-barred Sallow and also a striking Scarce Bordered Straw.

I aslo got in a few bits of work around the garden including tidying up the pond, the path and car park area and a bit of pruning on the tomatoes. Also needed to put woodchip down in the duck pen as they are making a mess in there. As it's been unseasonaly warm and dry a bit of watering was also needed.

In the office we made good progress with Thee Bryans stuff and getting the paperwork out of the way. 

Garden Firecrest (above), Chiffchaff (below), Blackcap (below that) and Marsh Harrier (bottom bird pic)

Scarce Bordered Straw- a shock at first as in the early light I thought my number had finally come in with Eastern Bordered Straw but alas just a nicely marked Scarce 

Pink-barred Sallow . NFY , now on 545 for the garden year. 

Black Rustic- now appearing. Lunar Underwings also building (Ivy must been in flower now) so all very much mid-autumn

Western Conifer Seed Bug - a new for garden HERE

Slow going in clear conditions

Met up with Marc this morning to have a look round Church Norton and the Severals. The high pressure condiitons continue with a south easterly swinging round to a westerly. 81 species HERE with highlights including a Merlin, Hobby, 3 Marsh Harrier, 2 Firecrest, 6 Goldcrest, Whinchat, 3 Stonechat, Spotted Flycather and some good vis-mig including 30 Skylark, 44 Meadow Pipit, a few Yellow and 'alba' Wagtails and counts of 1525 Barn Swallow and 670 House Martin. There were also quite a few warblers around including 17 Chiffchaff and 18 Blackcap. 

A nice selection of birds but still no scarce or rare migrant this autumn.  Apart from the Grey Phalarope recently there actually hasn't been a decent bird to twitch on the Peninsula since the April Woodchat Shrike. Hopefully a pay out is due soon and in the meantime just need to keep knocking.  

Bird of the day (or rather night) was a Tawny Owl calling outside the house at around 2am. My first for the year. Now on 183 locally. 

The moth trap was pretty quiet despite it not dropping to below 14 C. My MV is in for repair at the moment so I'm limping on with the twin actinic which is presumably part of the reason for the low rewards on that front too. Black Rustic was a new for year. 

Firecrest (above and below). A really autumn feel today with crests calling in the bushes, skylarks going overhead, chiffchaffs calling and the odd Song Thrush call. Mid-autumn is here. 

Spotted Fly on West Side

Difficult to capture the amazing spectacle of the hirundine passage and gathering this morning. These House Martins were swarming over the severals for a few minutes.

Long-legged Tabby- the first one in several weeks 

Clancy's Rustic- a few more of these recently. Overall moth migration is very low round here but as mentioned above down to one twic actinic trap at the moment. 

Last days of summer

The high pressure returned today and temperatures got up into the low 20s. I started the day off at East Side with 69 species of over 1700 individuals HERE, there were basically no bird highlights but a few increases in certain species including Turnstone (54 present), Shelduck (29) and a small increase in Pintail and Wigeon numbers. I also had a few Skylarks flying over- the first for the autumn. 

After a break at home doing some bits in the garden, office and kitchen (see below) I  decided to make the most of the weather so walked from Ferry to Church Norton. Additional species and migrants HERE. The highlight was a juv Marsh Harrier and a group of 5 Stonechat along the long pool. 

Only one Yellow Wagtail today following a very good run of them in the last few weeks. Still good numbers of hirundines around. 

Once again there were Clouded Yellows in small numbers more or less everywhere including in the garden. 

So basically a very quiet day but very nice weather.

An increase in Turnstone (above) and Shelduck (below) 

The small waders , Dunlins and Ringed Plover, were close today but there was nothing in them

A record count of Common Seal for me today with 16 animals on the banks at East Side

Little Egret with extensive yellow legs and some in lores too. Presumably immature transitional traits.

Stonechats- my first presumed autumn migrants in the harbour (following a local family party a few weeks ago)

With no Baird's, Buff Breasted or Pec Sand despite weeks of searching during an excellent season for american waders, consolation prize today was an omlete made from 100 per cent garden ingredients including Duck eggs, cherry, money makers and beef tomatoes, yellow and padron peppers, thyme, basil and parsley and garlic. There were no decent moths in the moth trap either. This post is basically a polite way of saying it was crap today, however, a crap day in nature is a good day in the matrix so all good. 

Local Round-up

Aside from a couple of days in the West Country last week I have mainly been stuck in the matrix doing paperwork and family stuff but I did manage to do a bit of moth trapping and bits in the garden and even scrambled yesterday for the Grey Phalarope on Ferry found by Jacob Bowley. I also managed to sneak in a quick look at Snowhill Marsh today HERE while on the family walk round East Head and this evening I popped out for an hour or so from Church Norton HERE. The highlights were 2 Ruff at Snowhill and a Curlew Sandpiper and a Spotted Flycatcher at Church Norton. A garden watch this morning before the gang got up produced a Hobby HERE. 

Matt was over on Wednesday and we did the first haycut in the back meadows and also sorted out the side and back gardens. There has been some periods of warm sun in the established westerly airflow and mid-week there were Common Blues, Small Copper, Small Whites, Cloud Yellows and also the first record of Brown Hairstreak for the garden. There have also been a couple of Common Darters and up to four Migrant Hawkers in the garden.

In the moth trap new for years have included Large Wainscot and Lunar Underwing but overall the traps have been quiet in the cooler and sometimes wet evenings. Friday night was the first time in months that I didn't catch a Small Mottled Willow. There was one last night with a Scarce Bordered Straw and the good run of Vestals continue with 4 last night. 

There have been Willow Warblers and Chiffchaffs feeding in the wild carrot in the back garden which is amazing to see, (there was a fall of phylloscs locally mid-week) and also a few Blackcaps and yesterday morning six Golden Plovers flew over the garden. Hirundines, mainly House Martins and Barn Swallows, and Meadow Pipits have been steadily moving overhead for the last few days. Yesterday morning's garden migrants HERE. 

Been harvesting the garden crops recently too, we left the sweetcorn too long but its good for the ducks (which are now laying up to three eggs a day between them) and the tomatoes, peppers and raspberries just keep coming. Also harvested the sunflowers and have buckets of seeds. After clearing the sunflowers and sweetcorns we have now got space for onion sets and broad beans to go in. 

First-winter Grey Phalarope (above and below) on Ferry. Looking very storm blown. Now on 182 for the local year.

Distant Curlew Sand at Norton- not sure on the age- looked very dark on the upperparts. There are a lot of american waders in Britain and Ireland at the moment, with a really good year for Baird's Sandpiper including one in Oxfordshire where they must have had their best year ever with mega after mega in my old county. Hope we get a good wader round here, relying on 'trickle down'. 

Willow Warbler in the wild carrot 

Common Blue (above) and Common Darter (below) in the garden meadows. Unfortunately I didn't get a photo of the Brown Hairstreak which was posing well on the Liquidamber but had gone by the time I got back with the camera. 

It's official mid-autumn is here. Lunar Underwing. Garden year list now on 543. Large Yellow Underwings continue to dominate the trap now with over 100 most nights. 'Migrants' in last day or two have included single Blair's Mocha, Scarce Bordered Straw and Clancy's Rustic,  two L-album Wainscot, two Small Mottled Willows, up to 3 Delicates and a couple of Rusty-dots and a handful of Rush Veneers. Also there is still a Hummingbird Hawkmoth around the garden in the day- almost an unbroken run of those for months now. A bit of colour in the trap is being provided by the odd Frosted Orange, a Red Underwing yesterday and the odd Sallow. After making a big appearance Feathered Gothics seem to be over. Notable absentees this year include Radford's Flame Shoulder and Cliften Nonpariel.  

We only did a hay-cut on a section of the back garden becuase voles were running out and also butterflies and grasshoppers were still using the meadow. Hopefully everything has taking refuge into the remaining part that we will do a later hay cut on. We can now feed the rabbits home grown hay too which they seem to be enjoying. We want to increase the plant diverstiy of these meadows so we have to do a cut and remove the arisings to try and get the nutrient level down. The meadow has been incredible this year (looks messy this time of year)- see HERE for when it was in it's prime and we hope to improve it even further next year. 

Our garden harvest festival. This is just what we have been collecting in the last few days. It's been relentless for weeks and still got plenty to come. One benefit of the extremely hot summer.  

A couple of days in the west

A couple of depressions crossed the Atlantic this week so I decided to position with Jaffa in Devon in the hope that there might be an influx of american vagrants that we could head to. There wasn't unfortunately apart from an American Pipit and a couple of REVs in Ireland but there was also a few more American waders along west coasts. 

As our main hope therefore was maybe a new wader we went to Siblyback Reservoir and Davidstow Airfield yesterday. The Pec Sand that arrived in a group of four earlier in the week was still present at Siblyback but there was no sign of the Buff-breast that was seen yesterday morning. There were a few other bits including Little Ringed Plover, Greenshank, Ringed Plovers and Dunlins and a few Wheatears HERE. 

Davidstow had a few waders including Golden Plovers, Dunlin and Ringed Plovers and also a few Wheatears HERE. We had a bit of excitement with a dark and heavily marked Golden Plover that showed some American Golden Plover features but after sharing standing shots with friends and eventually getting a view of the underwing (which showed too much white) we had to conclude that it was indeed a dark juv European Golden Plover. 

It was great to be back in Cornwall checking some of our old regular spots when Jaffa and I, Sam, Lee and others were at Plymouth University in the 1990s. It was nice to see  Davidstow airfield has not changed and is as surreal as we remembered it with waders running and up and down the old abandoned runways. 

Today we checked out Jaffas patch at the Otter Estuary and surrounding area HERE and HERE. Highlights included a juvenile White-tailed Eagle (a bird first recorded in the week which was a first for the site), a migrating Hobby, a bit of vis mig with nearly 80 Mipits west and some nice Cirl Buntings. 

A nice little mini trip and great to catch up with Jaffa.

Pec was a world year tick so now on 930 for the year. 70 to go to hit the target! 

Juv Pec (images above)

Dark juv European Golden Plover with a more typical one. We discussed the possibilty of introgresion or hyrbids and frequency of dark juv Golden Plovers in the population with Killian who also shared some images of extreme AGP look-a-likes from the Netherlands. Interesting stuff.  

Cirl Buntings (above and below) 

Juv White-tailed Eagle 

Gos Returns

After a day quoting in London I decided to unwind by spending the evening in the harbour. I wanted to check the waders on the falling tide but the water in the harbour was still full so I decided to check Ferry and Long Pool. HERE

A Marsh Harrier went over the field opposite Long Pool putting up about 100 Meadow Pipits, 100 Linnets and 30 Yellow Wagtail. There were also 4 Whinchat and a Wheatear in the fields. 

I got to the bench at the end of the Long Pool and decided to chill and scan. Soon I heard the call of a Curlew Sandpiper that flew around with a Dunlin before going back down in the saltmarsh with the roosting waders. Not long after that I had a distant Osprey heading west but I got distracted from the Osprey by some commotion over the harbour with a group of Rooks and Jackdaws incessantly mobbing a raptor. It was a large accipiter so I rattled off some shots and it looked like a Gos candidate but I wanted to check on the big screen as it was so distant. I followed the bird as it went low over Halseys and sent all the Woodpigeons up. 

I then went to Church Norton and bumped into Andrew and showed him the accipter photos and he agreed it looked interesting. When I got home I sent them round for second opinions and Andrew, Ian, Jaffa and Marc all agree it was a Gos too.  

Maybe the same bird I had a few weeks ago in July HERE. A local mega bird so hopefully it reappears and more people see it. 

Goshawk (all images above with Rooks and Jackdaws)

First-winter Whinchat