Friday October 1

 Before I get to this morning's effort I'll begin with the last day of September. My only involvement was to notice a flock of 30 Golden Plovers flying south over my morning stroll from house to paper shop in Winyates East. A good record only slightly tarnished by the fact I did not see them from the garden.

Meanwhile, Sam was at Morton Bagot and reported the continued presence of a few Swallows, and three Green Sandpipers.

It rained heavily overnight, so this morning I was not surprised to find that the flashes were both full to the brim with water and contained nothing better than seven Teal, two Lapwings, and three Snipe. Fortunately this didn't concern me because by then I had taken advantage of the morning sunshine to put my camera to work.

Kestrel

This Kestrel was peering over its shoulder at me as I parked up. Within half an hour I had established that the brisk south-westerly was suppressing Meadow Pipit passage to the merest trickle, and had seen a House Martin, which was to be my only hirundine of the morning. Two Siskins flew over (the first definite ones of the autumn here).

A bit of strategy was called for. Thus walking in the lee of a couple of hedges, with the sun over my right shoulder produced further opportunities to photograph sheltering passerines.

Chiffchaff

Long-tailed Tit

At least six Chiffchaffs, a Blackcap, a couple of Jays, six Reed Buntings, and four Stonechats were the birding highlights of a very pleasant couple of hours.

Stonechat - male

Stonechat - female

Robin

The hedgerows are bursting with blackberries, rose-hips, and hawthorn berries giving a pleasing backdrop. 

The weedy field beyond the hedge was by contrast almost birdless, but there were still six Skylarks to chase around. My P900 isn't really up to the job of flying birds, especially small ones, but I did get some kind of image of one of the Skylarks in flight.

Skylark

So no uncommon birds to report today. 

Tonight the emphasis switches to moths....and I caught 21 moths of ten species, including a Grey Shoulder-knot, another fairly common species which I've never seen before.

Grey Shoulder-knot

Brindled Green

The full list was:

Common Plume 1 (nfy),    Light Brown Apple Moth 2,    Red-green Carpet 2,    Light Emerald 1,    Barred Sallow 1,    Lunar Underwing 10,    Grey Shoulder-knot 1 (nfg),    Brindled Green 1 (nfy),    Large Yellow Underwing 1,        Square-spot Rustic 1.