Nice Yellow Wagtail Aston End

Had it not been incredibly hot last weekend, I would have taken a walk round Aston End on the Bank Holiday Monday, so with the weather being a bit better I did it today. If news been positive yesterday Colin and I would have tried to get the Brown Booby off St Ives in Cornwall, but with no sighting since early Thursday morning we decided not to go down there. Its a long exhausting overnight trip, not something I enjoy these days, as it really takes it out of me.
Anyway, the two hour five mile stroll wasn't too bad, but it seemed that birds were in short supply. No Skylarks for example. All the fields had been harvested, and some already ploughed, so whether the breeding birds had been pushed off or not Im not sure. I've tended to assume there is a small permanent population supplemented by migrant and wintering birds.
Basically the usual circuit started in the plantation by Gresley way where there was a big tit flock. The hedges along the lanes were pretty quiet with odd Chiffchaffs and Blackcaps now and again, and a rather smart Lesser Whitethroat at Lords Farm. Now and again small parties of Swallows were heading south, with a much bigger feeding flock near the paddocks by the river. While watching them, I heard a Yellow Wagtail. Initially I assumed it was a flyover but I heard it again and saw it in a ploughed field. Got a few photos before it eventually flew east.

There aren't many flowering plants around in the fields and margins, so there weren't many butterflies, thought Small Whites were seen frequently. There were a couple of Painted Ladies in a small sunny spot, and there were a couple of Red Admirals, Peacocks and Speckled Woods, plus a single Common Blue.

Got home to discover that the Booby had been seen at well from 1030am on the eastern side of the bay and then settled on rocks close to shore in St Ives itself, then flew off west around 1230.

Hot Bank Holiday

Glad we didn't go to the coast on Sunday.  Heard that there were queues all along the approach road to Holme jam packed with holiday makers with the wardens only letting a car through when someone left the car parks. Good job there wasn't a rarity there (like in 1993 when we turned up on spec to find that a Ruppels Warbler had just been found). Think it was the same everywhere, the very hot spell encouraging everyone to spend a day at the seaside.
We decided to avoid any traffic woes and stay inland, around the Chilterns. It was a bit hot though and the afternoon got a bit unpleasant.
We started off at RSPB Otmoor, a place we often end up visiting during August, though not normally this late. Unfortunately the seasonal trail through one of the meadows had been closed due to the breeding Turtle Doves (which we didn't see and they may have already departed). The nearby feeders had a lot of tits, some Chaffinches and Goldfinches and there were a few Bullfinch knocking around as well.
The grazing marsh was bone dry and there weren't any chats around, but a lovely Yellow Wagtail dropped down onto the overhead wires briefly.

Colin had bought a new scope and we were testing it out on a nice juvenile Whitethroat in the blackthorn. While we were watching, a Brown Hairstreak flew past. Good job too as we couldn't find any later along the Roman Road.
Lots of big dragonflies with several Southern and Brown Hawkers, hoards of Migrant Hawkers, Common and Ruddy Darters. One Black Tail Skimmer provided some variety, but strangely there weren't any damselflies of any kind.
We walked up to the northern blinds overlooking the pools but didn't get a great deal. We were told there was a Great White Egret around, and we missed a big flock of Greenshank that had dropped down onto one of the scrapes.
No sign of any Hobbies, Marsh Harriers or Cranes either so it was a bit of a let down really. One Migrant Hawker did the decent thing and settle down to pose for the camera, though it was rather hard to reach with the 60mm macro. The Ruddy Darters were a bit more obliging.

After lunch we drove down to Warburg. Rather too late for any of the orchids (which had been bad again this year with most being eaten). The wardens are looking at ways of reducing the damage.
We didn't get many butterflies here, apart from Common Blues, whites and a Brimstone. As it was getting very hot and humid we kept to the shaded rides but did venture out to the furthest meadow to see the Chiltern Gentians. There is some debate as to whether they are Chiltern, Autumn or hybrids and they are due to be investigated shortly.
The first one I saw I assumed to be a pale Autumn as it was rather narrow, and the ones we saw further along were much better with broad petals and much much wider than the ones up on Therfield Heath the day before. Whatever, thy are nice.

A Couple of Ticks

Hertfordshires had a couple of good butterfly records this week. There has been a Queen of Spain Fritillary at Patmore Heath (not seen since Thursday) and the first Adonis Blues since 1959 at Therfield Heath.
After taking Mum shopping I popped over to Therfield-actually Church Hill by Fox Covert. It was warming up nicely and not too hot. Not many birds about, various miscellaneous ticks and tweets in the wood so I didn't linger and went straight for the hill. Mike Illett was there and had found a male Adonis but it wasn't flying, just sat down with its wings closed. It did fly a couple of times but proved hard to photograph.
We were joined by another enthusiast from Hitchin and the extra coverage meant that we eventually found several males and one or two females. Mike eventually got an open wing shot but I didn't and had to settle for an underwing pose with just a hint of black and white the upper wing edge.

Still plenty of Chalkhill Blues, some Common Blues and Brown Arguses, several Painted Ladies and a few Whites, plus singles of Small Tortoiseshell and Peacock.
Mike had been over to check the local Quail earlier but they weren't calling so I headed back to Stevenage and stopped off at Fairlands Lake. Its been pretty good for waders this year, most seen early morning around the main lake, but a Green Sandpiper had been found on the balancing pond and was still present when I got there. Fairlands used to be a regular haunt but has been neglected to some extent particularly with changes to my work routine, so it was a nice local tick for me.

A Visit to Amwell Cut Short

Another weekend without any photographs.
Saturday was supposed to be rather windy, with showers at times, so I did the usual shopping run and followed up with some garden pottering. Turned out to be rather nice and perhaps I should have gone out somewhere. Still, glad I decided to not go to the Bird Fair as it seems to have been a rather muddy one.
The forecast for Sunday should have been pretty good, warm and sunny but there wasn't much around so I popped down to Amwell in the hope of going round Hollycross for the dragonflies. I wasn't expecting much and Barrys greeting along the lines  "hope you've going to give us a laugh and cheer us up" more or less confirmed my suspicions.
I had apparently missed the local Peregrine and a few late Swifts had gone through so there were a few things about. Despite the rather good conditions of the lake shore and water levels there weren't any waders apart from a reasonable number of Lapwing and two mobile Common Sandpipers. A couple of times everything was put up by the two resident Sparrowhawks and one Hobby was hunting over the woods. The only other raptors were four Buzzards.
Didn't seem to be any wildfowl other than the summering birds, and only one Common Tern remained from the small breeding colony. Everyone had gone for the usual Sunday walk about leaving me with Ron so we spent some time chatting, but abut an hour after I arrived rain started to set in-not in the forecast and it gradually got heavier. This brought in an adult Common Gull-my first of the winter and a small flock of Sand Martins. Ideally it should have brought in a decent wader and we stuck it out for a bit but as nothing arrived we both decided that it wasn't worth getting wet so we called it a day. Naturally by midday it was warm sunny and dry.

Brief Views of a Little Bustard in Yorkshire

Earlier this year, a Little Bustard as present at Slimbridge for a few days, but I wasn't able to get there. It wasn't exactly showing well, apparently being a long way off in long grass and usually only the head sticking up from time to time was all most ever got. The fact that the Barnacle Geese were doing (and looking almost) the same wasn't a great help.
Earlier this week, a photo of a male Little Bustard appeared on social media and was soon pinned down to fields adjacent to the river Aire at Mickletown near Castleford. It had apparently been present for some time. Access arrangements were made and it showed quite well at times and plenty of photos soon emerged. Unfortunately work got in the way as it usually does and I was only free on Sunday. Not to worry, as despite an attack by a local Peregrine it was still showing very well on Saturday even if the weather wasn't great.
Colin and I arrived on Sunday morning to discover a large line of people along the permitted track and no bird. I was told that it had been seen first thing and then walked out of view in a low lying field north of us. The problem was twofold. At the top of the path, being higher, views were possible if it showed feeding along a grassy fence line, but the angle was bad and only a small area was viewable by a distant gate. Almost zero from the only space I could get. Further down in the crowd, more fence was visible but vegetation obscured any views and only the head and neck was likely to be seen.
To make matters worse, there were lots of tall people, many wearing hats and 90% of the time I couldn't even see anything at all. It took a long time and a lot of manoeuvring to get a position where I was able to see anything. Added to that new people were constantly arriving and some though nothing of pushing through and standing in front of us, so there were lots of words exchanged, and tensions at times got high.
Sometime around 1030 some of my mates departed, having observed from much further down the path, they had head and beak views but not much else. Around 11, Chinese whispers seemed to suggest that someone had seen it somewhere but directions were vague and contradictory. There seemed to be a language problem as well, as what those around me seemed to think we should be looking two posts left of a gate actually turned out to be behind two poppies! Needless to say by the time we found the poppies it had vanished from view. A bit later, a further sighting near a small willow bush caused confusion as directions involved several stumps. These turned out to be fence posts. I actually had my scope pointing in the right spot anyway, but never saw anything, although several birders thought they could see something moving in the area. The same thing happened a while later in the direction of a big patch of teasels. Unfortunately I had a big hat blocking that part and I ended up on a smaller patch, so by the time I realised this, shifted the scope slightly it had vanished. I think that all of these sightings, if genuine involved a very obscured bird feeding along the fence behind a lot of tall thick grass and may not necessarily have been the Bustard.
By midday I was getting a bit tired, hungry and very thirsty. Backache and leg cramps were kicking in as well, and I was starting to feel like giving up and trying again some other time when hopefully it would be a lot more obliging. However around 1230 someone behind yelled that it was in front of the gate and I swung the scope round and finally got to see the thing. It was only in view for 10, maybe 20 seconds but it was good enough and a big relief. Unfortunately only a small percentage of the assembled crowd was able to get on it, and many couldn't even see the gate anyway.
Apparently there were a few sightings later in the day but I know many left disappointed throughout the day. To make matters worse, despite expectations that it would stick around there was no sign on Monday and a search of the fields by locals and the farmer failed to locate it. Hopefully its still around somewhere.
We spent an hour or so in the early afternoon at RSPB Fairburn Ings just to unwind a bit . This is one place where Willow Tits are still reliably seen, and a place we hadn't been to before. It turned out to be a lot bigger than expected and there were many miles of track around the many pools left over from coal mining. We initially went round a small loop around a pond dipping area, taking in several feeding stations. While we had several big tit flocks, a Treecreeper and some Tree Sparrows we near saw or heard Willow Tits. Brown Hawkers and Common Darters were frequent, along with a few Emperors. A walk east along what was called a river path to one of the larger lakes didn't produce a great deal. More tits, a few Willow Warblers and some wildfowl on the lake. I did wonder if the path, which followed a ridge along what I assumed to be a spoil heap might have some interesting plants-orchids were mentioned on the guide map, though I didn't find anything out of the ordinary.

Broxbourne and Danemead.

Though a bit late in the year for some of the butterflies I popped into the Broxbourne complex for an hour or so on Sunday morning.
I started off at Broxbourne west car park and did the usual circuit around what is now the grazed heathland. Birds were in short supply apart from a few tit flocks and several loud Nuthatches. A few crests and Chiffchaffs were heard, but the only warbles actually seen were two juvenile Garden Warblers which was a bit different.
Butterflies were out in force with lots of Meadow Browns, Skippers, Peacocks and whites, and a few lingering Ringlets. Didn't see any blues which was a it odd, and there were only a couple of rather tatty Silver Washed Fritillaries and one slightly better individual.

No Purple Emperors or White Admirals as expected, though i do wonder if they are still around since the area was opened up and much of the sallow trees and scrub had been cleared. The small oak trees were scanned but I only managed to see one Purple Hairstreak.
The pond has become very shaded and I only saw a few Common Blue damsels here. I did find one Southern Hawker and a few Migrant Hawkers, one of which posed nicely.

 Danemead was much the same, including, weirdly, yet again a Garden Warbler showing quite well.
No fritillaries which was a bit unusual, but there were a few Painted Ladies in the meadow. The Spittlebrook actually had some water flowing for once, though the adjacent pond had dried up. I had hoped that there would be a few epipactis helleborines (broad leaved is the expected orchid here) in flower but I couldn't find a single plant in any of the usual places. Not sure if its slugs or deer but I haven't seen any here for a few years now.

Framton Marsh Waders

After a bit of a break for a couple of weekends, I had a very busy couple of days.
The previous weekend was rather wet over much of the country following several extremely hot and rather unpleasant days. This resulted in a large influx of Wood Sandpipers along parts of the East Coast with three figure numbers reported from some sites. Many other wader species also arrived in decent numbers, and since it was going to be a very high tide around the Wash, it seemed to be a sensible idea to go and see some of them.
In recent years, RSPB Frampton Marsh seems to have become best place for passage waders and up to 26 species had been recorded in the first days of August, including the almost resident but generally elusive Long Billed Dowitcher. The 8m high tide on Saturday morning meant that there would be a massive number of birds on the reserve and we were able to arrive just as the waters were starting to drop.
Starting around the centre, Common and Green Sandpipers could be found all over the big lagoon, and there were likely to have been 10+ of each present. On juvenile Little Ringed Plover was also seen. There are four Black Necked Grebes there as well, though I only found one adult and one juvenile. They remained at some distance and my attempt at shooting through the scope wasn't overly successful with rather soft images at an equivalent focal length of about 3000mm.

Heading down to the sea wall where we were told that most of the action was taking place we stopped off now and again. Yellow wagtails were flying around with many tens of adults and juvenile birds associating with the cattle on the grazing marshes. There were several Wood Sandpipers on the pools here  though mobile and sometimes flighty. Someone had reported 15 here but I was only able to count 6, maybe 8 though  visibility from the road wasn't ideal. Trying from the higher sea wall wasn't much better due to distance and the increasing heat haze, but the six Whimbrel on the salt marsh were a bit easier to see.
Continuing along the wall, which was covered in thistles, measles and Painted Ladies we were able to check out the massive flocks of Black Tailed Godwits and Knot for other species. Dunlin were present in good numbers bit it was clear that many were flying out to the Wash and we were told that a Peregrine had flushed many, taking the Curlew Sandpipers and Little Stints with them. People were searching for the Dowitcher though Im not sure if it was seen while we were there, but we did pick up
maybe a dozen Spotted Redshanks, many Redshank, Ringed Plover Ruff, Snipe, Avocet, Oystercatcher, and a few Golden and Grey Plover, Turnstone and Bar Tailed Godwits, so we ended up with twenty species of wader here.

Ducks were starting to come out of eclipse. Mainly Mallard and Gadwall of course with some Teal, Wigeon Pochard and Tufties. I was able to find one Garganey but there were supposed to be several around. Much easier were the eight Spoonbill being big and white.
By the time we stared the return walk back to the car it had got rather warm and I was shattered (not helped by a bad few days at work and a very tiring day at Hyde hall Flower Show with Sarah on Thursday). As a result, while I checked the ditches for dragonflies it was bit of a struggle and apart from a few Common Darters and one Emperor. The intention was to return to the central hide after a bit of lunch and search in earnest but in the end decided it wouldn't gain much if anything so I suggested returning home via Therfield Heath and the ulterior motive of a county tick.
By the time we got there in the early afternoon it had clouded over a bit and the breeze had picked up. Walking through Fox Covert I could see many White Helleborines so it looked like it had been a good year, but I couldn't see any other orchids.
Out on the hillside Chalkhill blues were out in abundance among the Autumn Gentians, Harebells, Burnets and thistles. Large and Essex Skippers were present but the hoped for Dark Green Fritillary was a bit harder to find and took much searching as they were pretty much over.

  
Colin found two Spotted Flycatchers which were a very nice bonus and meant we needn't visit Sandon Church afterwards (the pair there have been successful with two fledged youngsters). Also a bonus was the two Silver Washed Fritillaries in the woods on the way back.