A break from boat painting today due to the forecast and an enjoyable day in the field. Firstly a stop off at Draycote Water, where I caught up with Richard and Dave and then on to Brandon Marsh for the remainder of the morning and afternoon. Despite another woeful attempt at weather forecasting by the met-office, there was in fact very little rain at all, and indeed some nice periods of sunshine!
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| Common Tern at rest - Draycote Water |
Draycote had at least ten
Black Terns, mostly way off towards Lin Croft point from my vantage point, six
Common Terns and a lone
Little-ringed Plover.
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| Juvenile Redshank Teal Pool |
I arrived at Brandon Marsh around 10.30hrs and decided to head straight off to the hides, in anticipation of the rain! At Teal Pool Hide a decent count of seven
Green Sandpipers, along with the above juvenile
Redshank! I bird which I believe seems to be causing a few miss ID issues, particularly over recent weeks.
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| Lone Snipe seen earlier on East Marsh, then showing well from the Ted Jury Hide |
After completing a tour of all the hides recording of note:
Common Sandpiper,
Snipe,
Hobby,
Little Grebe and
Water Rail I headed off for a tour of the remainder of the reserve.
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| Small Copper at Brandon Marsh today |
A good number of butterflies on the wing at various times and these included of note (3)
Small Copper, (10)
Common Blue and my first
Brown Argus of the year. Dragonflies included
Brown Hawker,
Southern Hawker and
Common Darter. Worth mentioning too the six juvenile
Mistle Thrush,which were in the field opposite the main Brandon entrance as I departed.
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| One of several juvenile Yellow Wagtails on the pontoons during the evening roost.! |
Closer to home the marina has been my main source of recording over the previous few weeks, with several juvenile
Yellow Wagtails joining the
Pied Wagtail roost each evening, a brace of
Common Sandpiper,
Red Kite over and both
Barn Owl and
Tawny Owl have also been noted.
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| Painted Lady - One of a trio at the marina on the 6th |
An excellent find of (3)
Painted Lady's on the doggie walking meadow, along with (2)
Essex Skipper on the 6th and while barbecuing on Saturday evening a
Humming-bird Hawk-moth was the main attraction, along with
Pippistrelle Bats, the International Space Station and the odd early Perseid meteor later in the evening. Or was that the wine!!
