After unexpectedly waking at 5am and witnessing a gorgeous sunrise an hour later I decided not to let the morning go to waste and made an early start at Draycote Water.
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| Gorgeous sunrise at the moorings this morning! |
It turned out to be quite an intriguing mornings birding locally, meeting up with Richard Mays and Dave Cox firstly at Draycote, breakfast at the Long Itchington diner, where we met up with Paul Cashmore, before heading on to Napton-on-the-Hill.
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| Ruff - Asleep for all of our stay at Hensborough Bank! |
Draycote was a little disappointing on the migration front to be honest, but did offer up a single Ruff, which didn't perform for the camera, (3) Dunlin, (2) Grey Wagtail, (6) Yellow Wagtail, (2) Common Tern, single Common Sandpiper and my first local Meadow Pipit of the late summer/autumn!
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| Grainy image of one of fourteen Spotted Flycatchers at Napton today! |
Napton-on-the-Hill was alive with Spotted Flycatchers, (14) in total, plus (3) Lesser Whitethroat and a single Common Whitethroat, a Common Redstart was briefly seen by Dave but unfortunately I didn't manage to connect.
The mystery of the day was a Raptor Sp. spotted by Richard which passed overhead at Napton, sadly at distance and despite having the four of us on hand we couldn't quite nail the ID. A really difficult one to call this with thoughts of a possible Black Kite sending the pulse racing but frankly, much to Richards disgust and frustration we simply have to let that one go!!
