I spent a couple of days down at Portland Bill staying at the Lighthouse Bird Observatory. The weather dictates the quality of the birds at this time of year and the direction and strength of the winds is the biggest factor. A strong WNW wind is the worst which means passerines will be hard to come by and seabirds will not be sufficiently close to shore. The opposite would be a light South Easterly, which would probably mean high numbers of migrant birds with a good deal of visible migration and the potential for rarities. Unfortunately the former conditions prevailed and Wednesday was a blustery and occasionally wet day, followed by a slight shift to a NNW on Thursday.
I called in at Blashford Lakes and also Lodsmoor in Weymouth on my route to Portland, where the only notable sightings were 5
Great Egrets and a large flock of c400
Sand Martins with a brief flash of a
Kingfisher and 2
Green Sandpipers, 4 Common Sandpiper.
After traipsing around the Bill area for the whole of Wednesday, when it was difficult to find a bird in the strong winds, the sum total was 2
Wheatears , a pair of
Little Owl and a handful of
Swallows, rumours of a flushed Corncrake enlivened events but too long spent with others padding up and down stubble fields did little more than disturb some newly fledged scruffy almost tail-less Pheasants,...mm.
Thursday did turn out to be a whole lot better. The winds lightened and some early visible passage included a movement of
Meadow Pipits into 3 figures, 8
Grey Wagtails, 17 Yellow Wagtails, 9 Pied Watgails, and 6
Tree Pipits. The sea had some early activity with
4 Arctic Skua, 3 Great Skua and 10
Manx Shearwater. and the best bird of the day was a
Wryneck that showed briefly in the Quarry before melting into the brambles not to reappear for the afternoon. Other birds included a
Spotted Flycatcher, Sedge Warbler, Whitethroat and over 30
Wheatear.
Always a worthwhile trip, although needing to book in advance to stay does mean a lottery with the weather.
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| Little Owl |
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| Little Owl |
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| Wryneck |
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| Wryneck |
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| Hummingbird Hawkmoth |
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| Hummingbird Hawkmoth |
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| Willow Warbler |
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| Wheatear |
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