Birds, wildlife and travel
A nice surprise this evening when a Sedge Warbler turned up in our garden pond. It’s the second we’ve had this autumn. I was able to sneak up on it and get a picture, but the pond’s a bit busy, so there was no chance of getting it unobscured, and the light had already gone, so it’s a bit noisy.
We had a bit of a warbler frenzy at that point, with a Willow Warbler, Chiffchaffs, Lesser Whitethroat and Blackcap pinging around the bushes near the house for half an hour.
A better picture of our Clifden Nonpareil, a real stunner.
An eventful weekend, with a spectacular end. We had a quick check for migrants at home on Saturday morning: two spotted Flycatchers the stars of the show, but our first Lesser Whitethroats of the autumn were good to see, and then off for what turned out to be a butterfly day. Some Queen of Spain Fritillaries at Peacehaven gave some nice views an then at Beachy Head some more common butterflies behaved well.
On Sunday, either the same two or two new Spotted Flycatchers posed together, but the year’s first Sedge Warbler hid in the pond vegetation to avoid the camera. Then off to Cuckmere to twitch the Baird’s Sandpiper that had just been found. A much-wanted British lifer bites the dust. Back home, we emptied out a truly pathetic moth trap: very few moths and nothing interesting, until our first Clifden Nonpareil opened its wings. Massive and magnificent! It’s not often an insect upstages a special bird, but the Nonpareil truly lives up to its name.
It was all a bit distant at Farlington Marshes this afternoon, although the birds were good, with Pectoral Sandpiper, Peregrine chasing down a Grey Plover (just missed) and a distant perched Osprey. Much nearer were the Common Darters in the pond this morning.
A bank holiday: do we tidy up the garden or go birdwatching? Well fortunately we can do both, because August Bank Holiday traditionally turns up migrants at home. Today was no exception, with a couple of Spotted Flycatchers feeding from the wires over the field next to us. We also had a Dark Bush Cricket that needed rescuing from the large amount of hedge trimmings.
Earlier on in the week a Latticed Heath added itself to the house list. It’s not very heathy around here, so this was presumably a migrant.
Free of the athletics, we got a chance to see a bit of wildlife this weekend, starting with a trip to a friend’s in Worthing to see the Convolvulus Hawkmoth that she had. (It would have been ours if it had flown a mile further north.)
A juvenile cuckoo in midweek avoided the camera, so it was left to Volucella zonaria, a large hoverfly, mimicking a Hornet to provide a bit of garden interest.
Pagham Harbour today yielded a Cattle Egret, but not the hoped-for Spoonbill, although a Whimbrel did at least stay put for long enough.
Our last visit to the World Championships was the last for Usain Bolt and Mo Farah too. If you had told us that Mo wouldn’t win and that Bolt would pull up after 10 m we’d have thought that it was going to be a massive disappointment. Far from it. The British silver in the women’s 4×100 relay picked us up immediately after Mo’s disappointment, and Bolt’s injury was missed in the excitement and jubilation of a British gold, so we had a fantastic night. It’s a shame to see the greatest of them all go out so cruelly, though – a great champion and a great character.
Another evening at the World Championships, near the women’s pole vault, which was excellent. On Monday we went round the excellent Pink Floyd exhibition and then we actually found a new bird for the year.
It’s been quiet birdwise of late, but things have started moving a bit recently, so obviously we’re doing something else for the next two weeks. Our first visit to the World Athletics Championships was excellent (better than the photos).
More excitement in the form of another new moth for the house list, and this one, a Dark Arches, is rather more photogenic. One of the young Green Woodpeckers finally sat in front of the camera; not brilliantly, but it does a neat levitation trick.
Yet more danger in the garden, as one of our many young House Sparrows became lunch for our female Sparrowhawk. If you’re upset by the sight of an animal suffering in the talons of another don’t look at the last picture, but what did you think Sparrowhawks eat, asparagus?
