Thursday 18 September 2008

Unhelpful weather but not totally dead

Heysham Obs
A little blip in the anticipated "easterlies for the foreseeable future" as a weak weather front produces F2ish west-south-west!

North harbour wall late afternoon
Sorry for the late posting here:
Shag - a very surprising minimum of 4, probably 5 juvs on the wooden jetty at high tide. This is the first major influx which has not been a result of onshore strong winds and is perhaps related to low double-figures recorded in the Walney area recently.
Med Gull - THREE adults sat in a line on the railings near some anglers at high tide. Two of these were known 3CY and had noticeably darker blackish-red legs than the 6CY Czech-ringed bird

Inshore
Shag - juv feeding in channel off NH wall
Little Gull - ad & 2nd W on mudflats by H 2 outfall
Little Egret - one OE saltmarsh creek
Med Gull - ad near LGs

Middleton IE
Tufted Duck (12) & Snipe (3)

Grounded
Willow Warbler - 1
Garden Warbler - 1
Wheatear - 2
Chiffchaff - 3-4 around office, one of which was brown & giving high pitched quite piercing calls (but not 'soft' like Bullfinch). Presumably abietinus
Goldcrest - 2-3
Raven - singleton blogging [no more posts of this sp. unless obvious movement]

Vis mig intermittent 0700-0930
Meadow Pipit - 54 SE
alba Wagtail - 38 SE
Linnet - 27 SE
Siskin - 2W
Reed Bunting - 2 SE (1 grounded for a bit)
Chaffinch - 38 S/SW
Goldfinch - 20 S & several blogging
Swallow - 27 S
House Martin - 2 S
Tree Pipit - 1 SE
House Sparrow - 1 grounded for a very short time before heading south
Grey Wagtail - 2 SE (one colour-ringed)

Elsewhere
Honey Buzzard Birkbank, then south at 1110hrs - no further details yet on morph etc.. 6 Curlew Sandpiper EM Pools.

NEW LINKS
It's the vismig season. Compare sites by visiting the Vismig link and Dave's vismig site.
Hone your bird counting skills - visit the counting game link opposite.

Chiffchaff fall and late Yellow Wagtail

Heysham Obs
A bit like the old days without the fitness level for me today. Pre-dawn mist net setting (just two), a Grey Wagtail tape, and then concentration on 'vis' between mist net rounds. This was a short session due to work committments (dawn-0900hrs)

Grounded
Chiffchaff - good numbers with at least 20 passing through the bushes within view of the NR office (4 ringed)
Goldcrest - just 2 (one ringed)
Robin - a lot of ticking birds first thing but just one ringed
Blackcap - thin on the ground this autumn so far, so a single low weight/low fat bird ringed was actually notable!
Kingfisher - one heading for the Obs Tower Pond at some unearthly hour (hence forgetting about it)

Vis mig
Yellow Wagtail - one quite low to the SSW at 0750hrs - sounded like flavissima
House Sparrow - one heard but not seen very high in sky heading south at 0840
Chaffinch - 42 SW
Meadow Pipit - just 152, mainly SE
Grey Wagtail - 4 S/SE (2 colour-ringed)
Siskin - 12 S/SE
alba Wagtail 19 SE
Redpoll agg. 1 S
Linnet - 6 S
Greenfinch - 1 S
Goldfinch - 71 S
Swallow - 18 S/SE
Mistle Thrush - 11 E
Raven - 2 E & 1 NW (not sure what the status of these was)

Elsewhere
Nothing yet but keep your eyes on the sky as plenty of Honey Buzzards on pager, albeit all but one east of the Pennines [Red-backed Shrike still Rossall]. Black-necked Grebe Conder Pool. Lesser Whitethroat and Spotted Flycatcher Freeman's Wood