I made two visits to the Brooks on Friday to see if the ongoing waderfest had any more surprises in store. At Winpenny in the morning there were five
Greenshank and sixteen
Ringed Plover while in the evening I bumped into Anna Allum and Graham Jenner and we all enjoyed good views of a
spangly
Wood Sandpiper. A
Water Vole swam across the pool in front of the hide which was a nice bonus. I ended the day with a watch across the Mid Brooks from behind the visitor centre which produced an impressive 75+
Rooks flying west to roost, then wandered over to the heath where a single male
Nightjar churred near Black Pond and a couple of
Stag Beetles flew around. Thankfully I remembered my insect repellent this time - the Pulborough midges are ruthless!
On Saturday morning I spent a couple of hours at Winpenny with Alan Baker where I finally caught up with the very smart summer plumage male
Grey Plover reported the previous couple of days along with the first summer bird, now present for its sixth day. It's good to see several
Redshank and
Lapwing chicks around now - apparently seven pairs of the former and twenty pairs of the latter have bred onsite this year, which is great news.
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| Grey Plover |
Also here were four
Greenshank and three
Ringed Plover. The North Brooks held a single
Black-tailed Godwit and a couple of
Shoveler and
Teal, while at Hail's View I found a hawking
Hobby, and the regular
Great Spotted Woodpecker pair still busy feeding young. By the time I headed home it was getting very warm so I stopped at Black Pond for a bit to take in the impressive numbers of dragonflies here, mostly
Four-spotted Chasers but also the odd
Hairy Dragonfly and others too quick for me to identify! (Odonatology is not my strongest subject but I'm determined this year to try and learn more as Pulborough is a perfect place to do so).
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| Four-spotted Chaser |
Just a couple of fairly brief visits on Sunday and Monday morning were enough to show the wader extravaganza was coming to an end with 'just' four
Greenshank, eight
Black-tailed Godwits and two
Ringed Plover on Sunday and just the Godwits again on Monday. Still, it was exhilarating while it lasted, and perhaps there's still one more gem to come before things really quieten down into the summer months? But then, if birding teaches us anything, it's to expect the unexpected!
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| Greenshank |
I spent most of Monday exploring some famous but hitherto unknown to me sites in East Sussex, trying to help Charlie Peverett with his attempt to record 110 species in the Newhaven/Hailsham area in a single day. I joined Charlie a few hours into his marathon at Splash Point where the sea proved to be very quiet but we still managed to add
Sandwich Tern,
Gannet,
Rock Pipit and
Kittiwake to the day list, along with a few other common bits. I'd never been here before so the Kittiwake colony on the cliffs was quite a sight to behold.
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| Kittiwakes |
Our travels later took us to Charlie's patch of Pevensey Levels, a remarkable East Anglian-style landscape, where fellow patch watcher Chris Ball had earlier found a
Rose-coloured Starling, which we soon caught up with, along with
Yellow Wagtail and
Hobby for the day list. We then headed to Arlington Reservoir, hoping the gathering storm clouds would drop a Black Tern or something special, but in the end the best birds here were
Little Egret,
Common Sand and
Nightingale, plus a singing
Yellowhammer which was another day tick. Charlie and I parted ways early evening and he went on to notch up 87 species in total; really not too bad for the time of year and the limited area in which he was recording. Perhaps we can try again next year with a bit more success!
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| Rosy Starling, Horse-eye Level - the fourth time I've seen this species but the first time in near full adult plumage |
