The highlight of the weekend ofcourse was the Pallid Swift from yesterday morning (HERE) but there were a couple of other good bits and bobs too. In addition to the Swift on the Selsey Bill Seawatch we also had a Merlin fly west and I had my first Great Northern Divers of the autumn and a few other seabirds on the move HERE. In the afternoon yesterday I decided to try the Medmerry Trail Sewage works for the Swift but it started raining so I went to the Ferry hide instead which was fortuitous as a cracking first-winter Grey Phalarope appeared for about 20 minutes. Earlier on in the day I also had Spotted Redshank, 3 Avocet and 2 Green Sandpiper on the pool HERE.
This morning I did a garden birdwatch before we went smashing pumpkins with the kids, the highlights being a Fieldfare and a few Redwings and a Moorhen calling from the ditch and a Curlew flying over somewhere calling HERE. This afternoon I sneaked out for a couple of hours and did Church Norton and west side until dusk and had 59 species of over 2000 individuals with the surprise of two Curlew Sandpipers feeding in the channel before flying west over my head calling. There were also 3 Marsh Harriers and a Bar-tailed Godwit amongst the usual crowd HERE. I also had a 'White Wagtail' amongst a flock of Pieds in the field by the church.
As hoped for there has been an influx of moth migrants in the same wind that produced the Pallid Swift but it's been a bit low key (about 20 species of about 50 individuals) with the highlights being 2 Gems, 2 Pearly Underwing, upto 10 Rusty-dot Pearls, a couple of Rush Veneer and a single Delicate. The deep southerlies resume from Tuesday with a more prolonged period of North African/Iberian air so it could be a very interesting week ahead.
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