Summer Storm Petrel

Sometimes a plan comes together. I got to the Bill this morning at 530 following a day and a night of F6-7 southerly/southwesterly winds in the hope of Manx Shearwaters, a late Pomarine Skua or a Storm Petrel. At 0605 I picked up a bird fluttering about 1ft above the waves, it was facing the wind and making very slow forward progress towards the west. I had already seen a few Barn Swallows already fighting agaisnt the wind so this stood out immediately with a different jizz. Suddenly the wind caught it and it flew back a few meters and then resumed progress fluttering close to the waves in a typical small petrel fashion. I wanted to get the rump on it as I was aware that distant Nightjars can be confused for petrels. It was within the mile basket line and just before the breaking water so must have been nearly a mile out! I kept watching it and sometimes it would gain a foot or more height and then silohuette agaisnt the white breaking water so I tried to get a record shot but had no way of seeing it in the view finder so tried to locate a nearby gull or Gannet and then try and find that, shoot and hope for the best. By a miracle out of about 20 shots I got something (below) but not much use. I kept on it because I wanted to see the white rump or even something on the underwing but it just looked dark and didn't want to make a mistake - it was either a closer petrel or a further away Nightjar but the fluttering flight, regular backward drift flights in the wind and resumed progress didn't look like Nightjar at all and on one occasion I lost it for a while and it looked like it went down on the sea. After a while on more than one occasion another bird got close to it, a Herring Gull, a Sandwich Tern and a Gannet and each time the bird really looked tiny in comparison so I decided to put the news out as Petrel sp- presumed Storm Petrel. 

Sadly I lost it after that but more than happy it was a small petrel and the default this time of year in these waters is European Storm Petrel. I didn't see any white on it, just couldn't see the rump but following discussion with Andrew and Sam that it quite often the case with birds off the Bill, with distant small birds looking south towards the morning sun, although it was overcast this morning. There's also been a influx of them in the west and south west today. So a local patch tick- now on 213 for the Peninsula and 175 for the year. 

Other than that there were a few Kittiwakes, 4 Great Northern Divers and a couple of Fulmar HERE. I tried again in the afternoon but not much else HERE.

On the way back to the Bill in the afternoon a Spotted Flycatcher flew along the lane in front of me. It had come out of Andrew's hedge and landed in an Oak tree further down the lane so I called Andrew and luckily we found it back in the original tree in Andrew's hedge- a garden tick for him. As I drove past the Ferry I had a quick check- one of the pairs of Avocets had chicks, the first this year as far as I know. 

It was a work day today with Matt at the Lodge so the rest of the day was spent doing the garden. 

European Storm Petrel - the dark shape left of image with Herrring Gull (right) for comparison. No awards for this pic! If you click on the image first and then zoom into the shape it appears you can make out a wing and body shape. 

First-summer Kittiwakes

Avocet with chicks on Ferry

Spotted Flycather at Andrew's House, photo by Andrew House

A few bits in the moth trap last night in the much milder evenings with migrants including a few Silver-Y and Diamond-backs. Moth of the night was this Oak Gall Moth, Pammene argyrana which was on the side of my van. A lifer. 

The Sweetcorn is struggling but the back meadow is coming along- remowed the paths in today (above and below) 

The Water Mint in the pond is growing well and the Hemlock Water Dropwort is now flowering with loads of insects feeding on the flowers. With a concerted effort to record more pan-species this year I'm collecting bi-catch from the moth trap and also got the survey mats down and collecting insects from there and also flower heads. The lodge list is climbing fast with 237 species (not including moths,butterflies,birds or mammals which are recorded seperately) now HERE. 

Summer storm

There was a F6 southerly/southwesterly today with frontal rain in the morning and then showers in the afternoon. I decided to let it brew for a while so got some things done in the morning and started preparing for our Bulgaria trip and then went out for a bit of seawatching in the afternoon from Hillfield Road. Checklist HERE with highlights including 2 Manx Shearwaters flying west close in, a couple of summer plumage Guillemots close in, a dark phase Arctic Skua on the prowl, 12 Sanderling east and nice feeding flock of gulls and terns.

The winds continue until tomorrow, reducing a bit but hopefully a few more hours of this overnight might stir things up a bit more. A Deserta's-type Petrel went east past Portland this morning so that is out there somewhere. I'd be made up with a Storm Petrel or a few more Manx Shearwater- the two main targets in an early summer storm round here. Will give it another go in the morning. 

I put the actinic moth trap out last night as despite the heavy rain the wind was from quite a deep south and was hoping for some migrants. Indeed I had 4 Silver-Y and a White-point, a couple of Turnips, a Portland Ribbon Wave and a  Dewick's Plusia which may also have been migrants. Also had a Dark-barred Twist, Syndemis musculana which was new for year. Now on 135 for the year. The Goosefoot Groundling HERE dissected and identified by Mike Bailey has been confirmed by Stephen Palmer and accepted by the CMR Colin Pratt so now on 645 for the garden. 

Gannets

Guillemot- rarely see them well from the Bill.

Dark-barred Twist- NFY

Silver-Y (above) and Dewick's Plusia (below)

Roseate Tern plot thickens

Ads Bowley went to see the Roseate Terns at Norton this morning only to find there were now five birds there. By the sounds of it that could be a Sussex record and certainly a local record. 

After having a look at the Roseates (I could only see three at one time) I decided to venture out to the tip of Pagham spit as never been there before and also couldn't be bothered to drive round to have a look at the roosting waders. Luckily the roosting waders came to me and landed on the spit. Checklist HERE with highlights including the Temminck's Stint still on Ferry, the Roseate Terns, a 2 cy Little Gull, 2 Kittiwakes, a Firecrest singing at Norton car park and still a nice roost of waders including 200 Dunlin, 120 Ringed Plover and 12 Sanderling. Also Greenshank in Ferry Channel and 2 LRP  and a Common Sand on Ferry.

Completely unrelated to this post, Stephen Culley sent me over the pics of the Amur Falcon we had in Oman which I've now added to this blog HERE. Cracking shots of it. 

Three Roseate Terns (all photos above) with Sandwich Terns, Common Tern and Little Tern

Common, Sandwich and Little Tern. The Tern action at Norton at the moment is pretty spectacular. At least 300 Sandwich, 12 Common, 70 Littles and the Roseates. 

First-summer Kittiwake (top right)

2 calender-year Little Gull (towards top left)

Temminck's Stint

Sleeping Sanderling

Dunlin, Ringed Plover and Sanderling

Greenshank- looks like it has moulted straight into winter plumage. Maybe this bird HERE photographed in same place a few days ago moulted from a first-winter to an adult winter but definitely not this bird HERE from the same area in late April which an adult summer 

The only NFY in the moth trap was Cyclamen Tortrix

Eyed Hawkmoth 

Twists and terns

I took Jacob to Children's Church this morning with my Dad. Because my Dad is down for the weekend I didn't check out Ferry this morning. At around lunchtime news broke of a Temminck's Stint on Ferry found by a visiting birder - blinking typical, one of the few days I haven't checked there in the last three weeks. However luckily the bird was still there and I bumped into Ian while twitching it. Andrew remarked later that he was even more miffed as not only had he checked the Ferry every single day but several times a day. Standard visitng birding antics :-) As Garry used to call them - poachers :-)  

While we were watching the Temminck's there was a report of a Roseate Tern at Church Norton. There have been some strange goings on with Roseates recently with an atypical bird last weekend and then yesterday a report of one turned into a rather unsual dark billed Common Tern (maybe something on the longipennis cline?) found by Andy the Vicar. 

Ian and I decided to go and check out the latest report. The bird was last seen on the metal work and quite quickly Ian picked it out complete with a light pink flush visible at certain angles. I wanted to get a diagnostic flight shot and when it flew up Ian and I tried to track the bird. On looking at the photo it had a Common Tern underwing. Had we seen the dark billed Common Tern from the day before? Ian put out the news and then redacted the news. Then Marc, Bart, Andrew and Andy the Vicar (who I had last seen blessing the flock at Church) arrived. We relocated the candidate and everyone agreed it looked like a Roseate. Then it flew up and this time we got the diagnostic underwing pattern. We decided we had photographed the wrong tern before. Then Marc exclaimed that the bird had just flown up and started chasing another tern. We followed both the birds now chasing eachother in display like flight and indeed as they landed it was confirmed that they were two Roseate Terns! Then things got even more wierd when one of them sat next to yesterday’s dark-billed Common Tern which is presumably the bird that Ian and I had falsely tracked. 

So alls well that ends well and after several days of controversial Roseate Tern sightings there was now a displaying pair! In a further twist, literally as I am writing this, news has just come in that there are 3 Roseate Terns?! 

There was also Common Sand, Greenshank, 2 LRP, 82 Blackwits (a further increase) and 34 Avocet on Ferry and 3 Whimbrel at Norton. 

The moth trap was more lively last night with 7 NFYs. Thank goodness the northerly airflow has shifted to a southwesterly with improving temperatures ahead (but quite a bit of wind and rain in the forecast too).

Temminck's Stint (above and below)

Roseate Tern showing the diagnostic underwing pattern of black confined to the tip and a lack of dark border on the trailing edge of the underwing hand

Two Roseate Terns (bird on far left and bird second to far right) 

Roseate Tern (on right) with the dark-billed Common Tern (maybe something along the longipennis cline?)   

Dewick's Plusia to the Ni-lure. NFY.

Portland Ribbon Wave. Another NFY.

Rosy Wave- always nice to see. NFY

Hook-streaked grass-veneer Crambus lathoniellus. Another NFY. Also had Cypress Carpet, Vetch Sober and Buff Ermine as NFYs. Now on 131 for the year.  The Roseate and Temminck's puts me on 174 birds for the year- very unusual for birds to be ahead of moths by mid-May. 

Cream-spot Tiger

It's finally looking a bit more summer like in the garden with our butterfly beds flowering now

Jacob and I did a bit more bug hunting this afternoon, checking the survey mats in the wild ditch (above). Latest pan-species observations HERE

Spot Fly

I checked out Ferry, Long Pool and the Tramway this morning before weekend proceedings started (my Dad's down this weekend). Checklist HERE. Highlight was a Spotted Flycatcher adjacent to Long Pool and, a further increase in Avocet numbers and a family of Great Crested Grebes. Also after failing to find any yesterday there was a small group of Knot in the centre of the harbour too. There were a few Swifts around which seem to have arrived locally recently with small groups over the harbour yesterday and the garden too. Also seemed to be more Reed Warblers on Long Pool so maybe new arrivals. A Hobby has been around our garden and estate for the last few days . 

I had the moth trap on last night and my lack of expectation was confirmed with nothing new or particualrly interesting. 

The milder air moves in tomorrow and the night temperatures are picking up so hopefully some more action soon. 

Spot Fly puts me on 172 locally for the year. The year ticks are slowing down now, my last one was the Red-crested Pochards nearly two weeks ago. 

Spotted Flycatcher. There was another one at Church Norton found by the Vicar Andy and yesterday there was an arrival of 20 at Portland (amongst other migrants) so the migration taps have been turned on again after the last ten days or so of cold winds and blocking conditions. The waders in the harbour seemed to have been able to keep pushing north this week - I guess where they are heading is more challenging than this. 

Great Crested Grebes with young 

Arctic waders

I ventured out today in the continuing north west wind and cool condiitons with little expectation. I had a quick look at Snowhill this morning where once again there was very little, just 7 Avocet and a female Wheatear of note.

It was then over to East Side where I bumped into Andrew and we watched a nice second calender year Little Gull together. There were very few waders in the harbour so I went off to the spit to look for birds roosting there at high tide. Checklist HERE. There were 144 Ringed Plover, 197 Dunlin, 1 Turnstone and 2 Sanderling in the roost which marks another significant increase in the Arctic waders in the harbour.  

Other than that there were no Barwits or Knots, very few Whimbrel and Grey Plover and nothing much else apart from the tern colony. 

There was ice on the car on Tuesday morning with the temperature going down to 4 C at night so the moth trapping has been uneventful. Milder air resumes next week so hopefully things pick up on various fronts. We are off to Bulgaria next weekend so one way or another things are going to get a bit more interesting.

2nd calender year Little Gull. I've seen plenty of Little Gulls locally but this is the first one actually at Pagham Harbour - now on 189 for the reserve. 

Dunlin and Ringed Plovers with presumed 'Tundra' Ringed Plovers (above) on their way to the Arctic and 'Taiga' Ringed Plover (below) nesting on the spit 

Sandwich and Common Tern 

Little Terns- lots of activity round the islands now where hopefully they will start nesting

Turnstone- really impressive bird in summer plumage 

2026 Ebird Data for Ringed Plover at Pagham Harbour showing the winter population leaving and then the second population in the Spring appearing in recent days. The zero data points unfortunately refer to no counts on those weeks and not zero birds. Was thinking of setting up a Pagham Harbour ebird account to transfer other observers data into a single hotspot to get some nice definition to the Ebird data.