Damp

The grey low cloud present when I arrived this evening soon started to produce drizzle. With no wind to speak of I soon found I was getting very wet.

About 40 Goldfinches were on thistles at Netherstead, but the trudge to the flash produced very little. I am starting to think there is something wrong with the flash this year. There should be plenty of Green Sandpipers by now, but not a single wader was present (apart from a couple of Lapwings).

As the rain set in I found I was hearing lots of birds calling "hweet". Six in all. Of these, I suspected four could be Redstarts and two Chiffchaffs. However, the two species sound very similar, and the only bird I actually saw was confirmed to be a female or immature Redstart.

Back at Netherstead I decided to sit in the car and watch the rain pelting down onto soggy Pied Wagtails and Reed Buntings in the reed-bed roost.

The only other species I saw in the reeds was a single Reed Warbler. As the cloud slowly eased away, the sun came out and the sky became a spectacular mix of grey and pink clouds set against a bright blue background. On the drive home I stopped to take a picture of a Buzzard silhouetted against a part of this backdrop.

Sunday July 13

Rather a cloudy start with a few showers of fine rain. As I was waiting for Dave to arrive I was surprised to hear, above the fizzing of the overhead pylons, the distant reeling of a Grasshopper Warbler. It was still here. I worked out it was singing from the field or hedge at the extreme south of the patch.

Dave and I approached and spent about an hour trying to see it. We eventually worked out exactly where it was.

Grass hopper Warbler

It was in this grass somewhere, but eventually we had to settle for extremely brief views and no photo.

As the weather improved we set off around the rest of the patch. A darter which showed well proved to be our first male Ruddy Darter of the year.

Ruddy Darter

The pinched-in shape of its abdomen is one of the best features of this dragonfly. Our bird list was pretty moderate. The Redstart was calling, but we couldn't see it, and two Little Ringed Plovers were the only waders apart from a few Lapwings on the flash.

The grass in the flash field has been cut, so the furthest flash is now visible, but contained only a few Mallards and two or three Teal.

So back to the insects. I got shots of a few common ones, and also a Flowering-rush.

Common Blue Damselfly

Flowering-rush

Gatekeeper (Hedge Brown)

A rather pale Narrow-bordered Five Spot Burnet

So a little bit quiet apart from the continued presence of the Grasshopper Warbler, now in its third week.

You couldn't make it up !

After a lousy day at work a stroll around the patch was just what I needed. A calm sunny evening. I parked at Netherstead and walked to the flash. The flash was just wet mud, and contained an invisible calling Green Sandpiper. The invisibility continued as I at last pulled back Kingfisher, heard only, and also heard the invisible Redstart again.

As I returned to Netherstead it occurred to me I hadn't photographed anything. The moon was showing well so I decided to aim at it and photograph the first bird flying past it. Ten seconds later something did. Click.

I looked through my bins to see what it was. It was a Little Egret. Good grief.

Getting closer

It flew languidly towards me. I thought about looking at it again but the photo opportunity was too good to miss.

85. Little Egret

For some reason it was flying with its bill open. Cooling down I suppose.

Into the sunset

It continued its westerly journey as a silhouette heading for the bright lights of Redditch.

Oh, and I found my mobile phone....on the back lawn.

Lost

This morning the realisation dawned that I had lost my mobile phone. The smart money is on my not so smart phone being somewhere in the long grass at Morton Bagot.

So this evening I set off to look for it. I got very wet and eventually gave up.

Still, my camera and bins came with me so I thought it was only right that I checked out the flash. Waders had arrived, not exciting ones, but waders none the less.

The four Green Sandpipers now had two juvenile Little Ringed Plovers and the first Common Snipe of autumn for company.

The LRPs and a Green Sand (proper record shot)

Common Snipe

From the hedgerow by the flashes I could hear the Redstart again, and also saw an unexpected Goldcrest. Moving on to the pool I finally got a shot of the adult Little Grebe on its nest.

Back at the car the reedbed is again attracting roosting Pied Wagtails, 21 this time. Quite a few Swallows and House Martins were swooping around, so they may also be roosting there.

So its off to the shops for me tomorrow.

And another thing

In the afternoon my family headed for Hillers near Ragley Hall for a double celebration of my mother's and sister's birthday.

What has this to do with birds? Well its just that from the little hide in the corner of the garden there I saw something I have only ever seen once before -  many years ago. During the latest breeding bird Atlas I failed to record this event anywhere.

What you are looking at is a Red-legged Partridge and three tiny chicks. Hard enough to see on a bare surface, and just about impossible in long grass.

I saw a family party of Red-legged Partridges at Bittell Reservoir in the 1980's, but I can't recall seeing any since.

Mostly about insects

A fine sunny morning. Dave joined me at 08.45 and we headed to the last known location of the Grasshopper Warbler. Sadly we were too late (either in the day or in the week) and no sound was heard.

My attention quickly turned to insects. It is now Skipper time and the increasingly worn Large Skippers have been joined by a new hatch of Small Skippers. The site also gets Essex Skipper and so I took lots of shots hoping to find one, but we eventually concluded we were recording only Smalls.

Small Skipper

The key features shown here are that the black tips to the antennae, though prominent, do not wrap around to the underneath, and also this male has a relatively long black scent line which is not parallel to the forewing. All very tricky.

As a relief from the Skippers we saw plenty of easy butterflies, including the first Gatekeeper among lots of Meadow Browns, plenty of Marbled Whites, and a few Small Tortoiseshells, Large Whites, and Small Heaths. I also got a shot of the underwing of a Comma.

Comma (showing the eponymous punctuation-mark)

 Dragonflies were also everywhere.The first half dozen Brown Hawkers of the year all failed to settle, while I did get shots of Four-spotted Chaser, Broad-bodied Chaser, and this male Black-tailed Skimmer.

Black-tailed Skimmer

Various blue damselflies were present with Emperors and Common Darters. However, my best "what on earth is that?" moment was provided by this beastie.

Volucella pellucens

The good old Internet gave me its name and added that they are a fairly common and widespread hoverfly. Pretty impressive though.

Another impressive insect which now occurs quite commonly here is Roesel's Bush-cricket.

Roesel's Bush-cricket

It's another indicator of a warming planet. Ten years ago they were restricted to the south coast, but they soon advanced in range and once here they became plentiful.

So did we actually see any birds? Well yes, we got one notable species for the time of year in the form of a juvenile Grey Wagtail. Unfortunately I failed to get even a record shot before it flew towards Netherstead Farm and was seen a few more times in flight. The flashes produced only three Green Sandpipers and three Teal. The pool still contains at least one Little Grebe, while a young Great Spotted Woodpecker posed nicely to have his picture taken.

Great Spotted Woodpecker

Mystery birds

I'll start with a mystery bird photo. Answer at the end of this post.

Headless chicken?

The flashes contained four Green Sandpipers, but no Common Sandpiper. The early autumn feel was enhanced by the presence of a substantial Tit flock which also featured a Nuthatch, Blackcap and several Chiffchaffs, one of which was giving a very strident "hweet" call. "Hweet". I say Chiffchaff, "Hweet" Hmm. I started to get interested in seeing it. "Hweet". It was somewhere on the otherside of a thick hedge. "Hweet". It stopped calling, so I wandered on. "Hweet". Oh for goodness sake. "Hweet tick" Now I was really interested. I climbed the public footpath gate, currently padlocked! and tried walking to the point where I heard what I was now pretty sure was not a Chiffchaff. The light faded and there was no further sound. After another 10 minutes a bird flew and landed in the hedge. I focused on a superb male Redstart before it flicked back into the thickest part of the hedge.

I resumed my walk back just as the last rays of sunshine burst from beneath the cloud cover bathing the whole landscape in a glorious orange glow. The pool still hosted a Little Grebe, while 12 Swifts and two Sand Martins hawked insects overhead. Another sound entered my consciousness and stopped. Then started again. It was faint, but surely a reeling Grasshopper Warbler. I headed across the field away from the pool and stood at the top of the ridge. Sure enough it started again, still distant but much clearer. I decided it was singing from the hedge at the back of the ridge field but decided not to investigate further. Presumably the bird heard on June 22 is still here.

Back at the car a cacophony of Tawny Owls was hooting from Bannams Wood. The sun still hadn't quite set.

Oh yes, the mystery bird.

Cormorant

What a disappointment.