Friday 8th October - Selsey and Sardines on Toast

Couldn't make a day of anything as again found myself waiting on work emails. Decided to go to Selsey for a couple of hours and managed a seawatch between 8.30 and 10.30. There was a brisk East wind but low cloud - the mile basket was only just visible. There was a steady migration, with hundreds of hirundines moving East - Mainly Swallows and some House Martins.  Passerines off the sea all moving North were Meadow Pipits (53), Skylarks (14), Pied Wagtails (18) Chaffinch (4). On the beach Rock Pipit (1), Wheatear (1) and Grey Wagtail (1), Sanderling (4), Turnstone (68).   And offshore, Common Scoter (22 E), Bonxie (1), Guillemot (1 os), Razorbill (1 os), Arctic Tern (1 juv E), Sandwich Tern (26 E), Med Gull (3E) Brent Geese (10 W). I had a quick look at Church Norton on the way home, but the tide was high and the wind kept any passerines down. A Peregrine was sitting on one of the islands and and with several Little Egrets and small numbers of Brent Geese a few roosting waders were visible, Grey Plover, Dunlin, Knot, Bar-tailed Godwit.

Working in London, lunch tends to be a slightly rushed branded sandwich (i.e. Pret / Eat etc) and after several years of said sandwiches there is a certain blandness to the packaged same taste, despite the freshly made on-site claims. So my sardine on toast lunch at home was gourmet by comparison, it had also warmed up enough to eat this outside. Tinned sardines were a more familiar lunchtime staple when I was growing up and so there was a certain comfort element to lunch I hadn't experienced for a while. My afternoon consisted of a few work calls and emails, mowing the lawn, and refreshment breaks whilst generally scanning for birds and it was now a very pleasant temperature and bright blue skies. I had  Buzzard (6), Sparrowhawk (2) including a male that nailed a Chaffinch in the garden, Kestrel (1) and  Hobby (1) (circling eating a dragonfly through the scope). There was also a continuation of this mornings migration, despite being some 20 miles inland. I counted Meadow Pipit (18) and  Skylark (2) flying north. Also seen Bullfinch (1), Linnet (2) and the normal feeder crew.