Pollinated male Chiffchaffs and female Goldcrests

Heysham Obs
Another pretty good early spring migration morning, highlighted by a significant influx (at last) of male Chiffchaffs, some showing evidence of pollen, apparently from 'Mediterranean' flora, on and around their foreheads.

                                                                                                    Thanks, Janet

Grounded Heysham NR/dog track/Ocean Edge
Goldcrest - not many and all females (11 ringed)
Chiffchaff - probably at least 20 migrants (9 ringed), a good spring day count for here
Wheatear - 5 Ocean Edge foreshore
Other ringing included Lesser Redpoll (first 3 of the year) and Meadow Pipit (21)

Vis mig 0700-0930
Meadow Pipit - 448 (Peak time 0830-0900 when 265 were logged); then small numbers moving all day
redpoll sp - 3
Siskin - 14
alba wagtail - 9
Skylark - 1
Goldfinch - 5
Sparrowhawk - 3 at 0940
Reed Bunting - 1
Coal Tit  - 2
Carrion Crow - 2 north-east
Small flocks of Meadow Pipit, Siskin and redpoll still coming over at 1600hrs.

Nothing visible on the sea except a Great-crested Grebe due to poor visibility.

68 Turnstone on the wooden jetty

Plenty of Meadow Pipit

Heysham Obs
Slightly murky 'clear-sky' morning producing a lot of northbound Meadow Pipit and a decent number of grounded Goldcrests, especially after the easterly wind kicked in about 0830hrs.

Vis 0730-1330 (quite a few short breaks during this coverage)
Meadow Pipit - 1088. Bulk of movement came to an end at 1330 but odd ones continued to move through e.g. 4 at 1540
Siskin - 50
alba wagtail - 42
Lesser Redpoll - 15
Goldfinch - 15
Greenfinch - 4
Collared Dove - obvious migrant high to NE early morning
Sparrowhawk -3 singletons east
Kestrel -2
Common Buzzard -1 flew to the east at c1100hrs
Skylark - 1
Linnet -9
Grey Wagtail -1
Whooper Swan - 35 at 0715 and 3 at 0830 north

North Harbour Wall
Wigeon - 2 in channel
Eider - 72 in Kent channel
Red-breasted Merganser -2
Linnet - 2 on food
No Twite
Gannet -3 out
Wheatear - 1 female landed briefly

Grounded/Ringing (to just after 1000hrs)
Chiffchaff - singing male by the reserve entrance and passage male early morning by the office
Goldcrest - 37 ringed, at least 10 seen to escape from nets as the wind increased, plus others obviously moving through - estimate 70+.  We tend not to dwell on ringing totals on this site, but it is worth mentioning that the Goldcrest total of over 120 ringed so far is already the highest spring total in the Obs history (since 1981).  Only two springs ago (2009), just one individual was seen and none ringed, following some severe weather!
Meadow Pipit - 9 ringed = 0.1ish% of those seen!
Dunnock - 1
Wheatear - 7

Moths/butterflies
Late Chestnut of interest. Peacock butterfly seen on reserve - surely more than this around?

Male and female Gadwall at Middleton:

Distant Osprey highlights some excellent coverage

Heysham Obs
Work-related coverage added some bits and bobs today, as is inevitable during the migration period.  Mid-afternoon saw an Osprey circling high then heading north being mobbed by a black-backed gull as viewed in the direction of Grange from Heysham heliport area

Grounded migrants
Still no Chiffchaff on HNR or dog-walk strip!
Goldcrest - 20+ (13 ringed)
Wheatear - 4 OE foreshore

Vis mig
Meadow Pipit - trickle with about 70 north during the morning
Chaffinch - 10 north first thing
Carrion Crow - 2 north
Goldfinch - 1 north

North wall
Twite - c7 with at least 3 unringed
Linnet - 7
Shag - one 2CY in the harbour

South of the harbour
Med Gull - 2CY on the tideline by the sewage pipe at c1400hrs
Little Gull - adult flying into the Bay about 1410hrs
Knot - 18,000 between Ocean Edge and Lune Estuary late afternoon, then 16,000 of these flew across the Bay towards Barrow!

Moths
Diurnea fagella was new for the year - 3 of them, also a Shoulder Stripe of note.  Plenty of bumblebees prowling around today looking for nest sites

High-flying Red-throats

Heysham Obs

The elusive Green Woodpecker and male Pied Wagtail taken today.  Thanks Janet

North harbour wall

0730-0830

Twite - 4 on the food

Linnet - 1 on the food

Pied Wagtail - male as per usual

Dunnock - pair on the mound, one singing.

Vis mig

alba wagtail 4 north

Meadow Pipit 7 north and another 6 north 0835-0905

Grey Wagtail 1 from south which landed 

Red-throated Diver - flock of 25 very high above power station, seen when there was a break in the cloud, heading north.  Just shows how easy it is to miss this species during 'conventional' seawatching viewing fields - this observation was 'pure chance' during a break in offshore coverage

0835-0905

Shag - 2CY by the waterfall

Purple Sandpiper - 2 on wooden jetty

Turnstone - c65 wooden jetty

Nothing moving offshore in improved visibility


Dog track pond area
Goldcrest - 2


Middleton NR & area
Green Woodpecker

More bits over the sea and Meadow Pipit increase

Heysham Obs

Wheatear Ocean Edge today - thanks Janet

North harbour wall 0700-0850
Meadow Pipit - 80N
alba Wagtail - 18N
Red-throated Diver - 10 sightings (7 in, 3 out)
Siskin - 1N
Linnet - 1N
Kittiwake - 30+6+35 'in'
Gannet - 10 'in', including flock of 7
Whooper Swan - 19 north over the sea at 0754

N H Wall  0930-1130
Feeding Area:
Twite - 11 (all ringed - colour combinations from six different seasons)
Linnet - 6 (one ringed left leg)
Goldfinch - 2
Dunnock - 1 (ringed right leg)
(ajd)

Ocean Edge
Wheatear - one

Office area
Trickle of Meadow Pipit and Siskin (6+)
Goldcrest - 1 ringed
Coal Tit - passage bird ringed (second this week and unusual in spring)

Moths
The most interesting of 14 individuals was a single Shoulder Stripe

Nice sunny day for admin

Heysham Obs
A day for leaving everyone else to pull-back Laughing Gull for Cumbria and, apart from some early movement on the sea, one of those clear northerly-wind days when you can get on with admin catch-up without worrying what you are otherwise missing.

North harbour wall 0645-0830
Twite - 8, but no food left, put out at c0900hrs
Linnet - 2
Rock Pipit - migrant on the mound, then flew north
Red-throated Diver - 14 'in' (two lots of 4, rest singletons) and one out
Kittiwake - flocks of 18+16 floating in on the sea, then circled up and headed north
Common Scoter - 6 out
Little Gull - adult winter 'in'
alba Wagtail - 4 NE
Siskin - 1 NE
no Meadow Pipit passage

Middleton NR
Tufted Duck (19), Goldeneye (1 female)

Office area
Green Woodpecker - heard early morning
Raven - on the pylon
Goldcrest - 3 (2 ringed)
Siskin - 11 NE (one ringed)
Meadow Pipit - conspicuous by absence - only 5 seen/heard
Chaffinch - 7 NE
Pink-footed Goose - c100 north just to the east of here

Half Moon Bay
Wheatear - 1 male

Moths & Butterfly
The only new one for the year was a Herald (mention of Hebrew Character (6) and Clouded Drab (1) will cease forthwith!).  Small Tortoiseshell out in suburban SD46A but no check made on nature reserve.

All sorts of odds and ends on the move

Heysham Obs
Heysham NR office area
My muttered request to the rain clouds to stay away from here worked well-enough to allow a morning's ringing, albeit with double the usual number of mist-net rounds and a careful eye kept on the sky.  The ringing was not quite what was expected with a real mixed bag, in contrast to the Goldcrest-fest of the previous few days
Blue Tit - three unringed birds caught
Long-tailed Tit - unringed bird caught
Dunnock - unringed bird caught
Robin - 4 migrants caught
Blackbird - female ringed with 'continental' wing length
Goldcrest - just four ringed and another escaped from the net
.............plus a few Chaffinch & Greenfinch finches  

North harbour wall
Twite - 10 (one unringed out of 7 examined)
Linnet - 2
Goldfinch- 2
Song Thrush - one on mound
Robin - one on mound (first for a bit, presumed migrant)
Common Scoter - 65 (flying about, then on), 4 'in' at 0800hrs
Red-throated Diver - 2 'out' at 0800hrs
(no Shag seen)

Half-Moon Bay
Wheatear (2) - 2CY male-type and ad male-type - same birds as yesterday moved north a bit?

Vis mig by the office
Sand Martin - 2 north (IOY)
Sparrowhawk - female north-east (high)
Woodpigeon - possible migrants comprised flocks of 5 & 4 & 6 arriving from SE and landing
Meadow Pipit - 15 north
Sisikin - 3 north
Chaffinch - 14 north
Grey Wagtail - one north

Moths
Hebrew Character (12), Clouded Drab (1), Double-striped Pug (1)

Good variety including slightly overdue Wheatear and Chiffchaff

Heysham Obs
Office area
A bit breezy but quite a few birds around
Goldcrest - 30+ (17 ringed)
Robin - 2 migrants ringed
Coal Tit - passage bird ringed (unusual in spring)
Reed Bunting - 2 vis mig birds and one caught which had been ringed on Walney, across the bay (details not known)
Grey Wagtail - 6 north - all early morning as the nets were being set
Meadow Pipit - 109 north
Chaffinch - 15 north (mostly early morning)
alba Wagtail - 12 north
Siskin - 5 north

North wall
Intermittent early vis mig saw far fewer birds than heading across the reserve, but the sea could be covered....
Shag - 3 still around
alba Wagtail - 11 north
Meadow Pipit - 21 north
Skylark - 1 north
Siskin - 4 north
Goldcrest - one on mound
Red-throated Diver - flock of 6 'in' at 0915hrs
Gannet - flock of 6 adults 'in' at 0850hrs
Twite - probably no more than 10, including the 'winter resident' Machrihanish bird and one unringed bird (5 caught)

Ocean Edge
Wheatear - Two:  probably 2CY male mid-afternoon and a bright probable adult male just after a rain shower at 1700hrs
Little Egret - one off Red Nab (but no sign of Little Gull on incoming tide)
Linnet - c6

Middleton NR
Chiffchaff - one singing by no swimming pond
Gadwall - 2
Also: 3 mute swan, 5 coot, 3 moorhen, 16 tufted duck, 1 goldeneye, 4 mallard, 2 little grebe

Goldcrests!

Heysham Obs
Significant Goldcrest passage today with only a limited ringing effort next to the office seeing as many as 36 new birds and one rather unexpected retrap from last autumn.  Up to 6 appeared 'in-off' the foggy sea on the north harbour wall mound, mainly after mid-morning

Becoming regular at Heysham NR but the first to be photographed - thanks Janet

Vis mig
Grey Wagtail - 4 (including 3 together)
alba Wagtail - c15
Meadow Pipit - c40, possibly many more, but mostly above the cloud level!
Siskin - 1
Chaffinch - at least 7 north

Grounded 
Still no Chiffchaff or Wheatear
Goldcrest - 50+
Robin - 3 unringed birds caught by the office

North harbour wall
Twite - odd - c27 early morning included 7 unringed birds out of about 12, then they all seemed to fly off to the SW and there were no further sightings all day
Shag - one
Eider - 110+

Ringing
Cant remember exactly but newly-ringed approx: Goldcrest (36), Chaffinch (2), Goldfinch (3), Greenfinch (4), Robin (3), Blur Tit (1), Meadow Pipit (2), Blackbird (1), Linnet (2)

Ocean Edge area
Nothing of interest passerine-wise
Little Gull - adult still on heyhsam 2 outfall on the incoming tide
Little Egret - one next to the sewage pipe
Wigeon - just 6 left

Moths
Early Grey, Clouded Drab, Common Quaker, March Moth, Hebrew Character and an agonopterix still to be identified but probably heracliana or an obscure form of arenella

Male Rustic Bunting!!

Heysham Obs
Rustic Bunting
At 1020hrs, an unfamiliar flight call was heard approaching from the south.  This was repeated about 4 times before a small bird was located high in the sky.  After circling and giving a few more calls, it landed in a willow bush neat to the reserve office.  Binoculars were grabbed and expecting, at best, a Yellowhammer (rare here) giving a consistently odd call, I was surprised to see a "black head".  The call definitely wasn't Reed Bunting!  Then it turned sideways in full view.  Wow!  All the time it was giving this clipped call.  After about 10 seconds absorbing this and a bit of unrepeatable language, it headed off to the north-east over the classroom, still calling, and was last seen at a height level with the top tier of the nearby pylon.  "Vised off", and the obligatory search of the north-east corner of the nature reserve drew the predictable blank.  Seen this several times here - a 'vis mig' bird landing, contact calling and then changing direction slightly when taking off again

Quite a bit of odds and ends of migration this morning 
Northbound vis (but coverage intermittent)
Meadow Pipit - c45
alba Wagtail - c15
Chaffinch - c12
Reed Bunting - 3
Siskin - 2
Pink-footed Goose - flock of 86

Grounded
Goldcrest - 8 ringed, but seemingly not many others around, perhaps 5 additional birds
Robin - a few migrants around (birds being chased by 'residents') with 4 ringed, including a very orange/grey low-weight bird
Redwing - one
Blackbird - 4-5 presumed migrants
Song Thrush - one probable migrant ringed
Wren - one unringed bird

North wall
Twite - 27
Linnet - at least 8
Goldfinch - 2
Shag - just the one seen

Moths
6 Hebrew Character and two new species for the year: a routine couple of Common Quaker and a rather more interesting third site record (and 30-something county record) of Agonopterix ocellana