Sue visited this weekend and we managed to pop out a couple of times birding. I had a look round Church Norton, the Severals and Pagham Spit on Saturday morning- not a single summer migrant there (there were Wheatear and Black Redstart at the Windmill Beach nearby). Then we all had a family walk round East Head after pub lunch at the Lamb. Again no summer migrants but a nice flock of 37 Avocet on Snowshill Marsh. In the evening we had a look round the Keynor Estate to Ferry- 7 Redwings were the highlights.
This morning we headed over to Windmill Beach but no sign of any summer migrants but we did have 4 nice adult Little Gulls fly east from Medmerry Breach (31 were logged off the Bill) and also 5 Whimbrel flew east too. Also a few Sandwich Terns, Common Scoters, Red-breasted Mergansers and a couple of Great Northern Divers off shore. On the way back a Blackcap flew in front of the van at Paddock Lane and landed in the hedge- a nice male (local year tick- 131 for the Peninsula) . This evening after Sue left I had a look round Mill Lane marsh and the rough ground behind there - the highlight was a flock of 60 Meadow Pipits in the rough grass.
So basically despite a lot of searching for early summer migrants the only thing we could dig out was a single Blackcap. There have been a few summer migrants on the Peninsula this weekend found by others but in very low numbers including four or five other Blackcaps, two or three Black Redstarts, single Wheatear and single Swallow and two Sand Martin. Other migrants have included March waterbird migrants including Brent Geese, Red-throated Divers, Sandwich Terns, Common Scoters, Med Gulls, Lesser Black-backed Gulls etc and Mipits and a few alba wagtails and Skylarks overhead.
Compared to other parts of the south coast there is (in addition to a lack of overshoots from last week which are all concentrated in the west and Ireland ) a noticeable lack of any Chaffinch migration- which seems concentrated off east Kent and 9000 over Dungeness today (seemingly more in the way of Wheatears, Ring Ouzels and Black Reds out that way too) and there seems to be a lot more Meadow Pipits moving out to the west from Portland westwards (and over 5000 moving north past Lanchashire watch points). Portland typically is testiment to the micro-effeciency of migration routes across the Channel with birds funnelling tightly and there are more summer migrants there than round here (but still in very small numbers for them) . The effect of the Isle of Wight blocking the Peninsula and the relatively broad geomorphology of the Peninsula presumably disperses migrants more. I have been pretty shocked how few summer migrants there have been round here in the last few days considering the south east winds and low cloud and light rain.
The moth trap was pretty lively last night with 74 individuals of 16 species including a few new for years.
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