The late shift

This evening I didn't get to the patch until 8.15pm for no better reason than a desire to watch the cricket highlights.

It was a sunny, quite still evening, and the reed-bed at Netherstead immediately provided me with a little reward as an agitated Reed Warbler mobbed me.

Reed Warbler

I arrived at the pool just in time to see a birding couple heading back up the slope to Bannams Wood. I failed to recognise them, and wondered what they had seen. At the flash I was initially met with a birdless scene. Not a thing on the nearest flash, and only Geese and a few ducks visible on the furthest. Eventually I spotted a Green Sandpiper, a few Teal and the Shelduck. Then a cow arrived for a drink and spooked a previously unseen Common Sandpiper. Things were looking up.

The Redstart started calling in the hedge, and I just caught a flash of orange but not enough to determine age or sex. Another call, this time Common Sandpiper. It had evidently flown to the nearest flash. The light was fading but I got a record shot.

Common Sandpiper

More calls, this time Green Sandpipers. Seemingly from nowhere six Green Sands joined it. Presumably they had all been hiding on the furthest flash. Satisfied that I wasn't going to see anything else I started to head back. Eight Swifts appeared, and hawked late flying insects over the pool. Scanning the pool itself, a movement caught my eye. A fluffy grey tail disappeared behind a patch of sedge. I thought I knew what it was, and sure enough I was soon proved right.

Eat your heart out Springwatch

This was my first daylight Badger here. I did see one in the car headlights once, and the discovery of the occasional corpse proves there is a healthy population, but for a diurnal birder like myself this was, as they like to say on the telly, quite a treat. The final bird of the evening was a seventh Green Sandpiper, this time on the pool.

Not a bad evening.