The weather got stuck into a strong North-Easterly wind and clear skies through the week boosted by a Super Moon peaking on Wednesday. The result of this seems to be to have halted proceedings as far as migration is concerned, perhaps with the exception of hirundines.
On Monday 16th I returned to Selsey, thinking there maybe an improvement in migrants there after the bonuses at Black Down yesterday. There were bits of interest which combined 2 Arctic Skuas on the sea at the same time as a Peregrine, a Black Tern moving East, a flock of 9 Shags, then on the move were a minimum of 200+ House Martin, 150+ Swallow and 10+ Sand Martin, with numbers probably underestimated due to swirling groups of birds. a couple of Yellow Wagtails, 5 Grey Wagtails, 2 Pied Wagtails and 2 Chiffchaff were the highlights of passerine, although a 20+ flock of Linnets was probably a newish arrival.
Moving on to Church Norton, it proved very quiet, with the highlight probably 5 Mistle Thrushes that flew over. Otherwise a Whinchat, 3 Stonechat and the same number of Whitethroat were all that were seen in the bushes and the harbour was pretty quiet for waders a small group of distant Grey Plover, 2 Bar-tailed Godwits, Whimbrel , Curlew, Ringed Plover and Redshank were all fairly scattered.
The bonus arriving at home was yesterdays Turtle Dove was seen again, although this time for a shorter period.
Inland movements of hirundines and pipits tend to be a more limited event compared to what occurs on the coast, but yesterday was a bonus day at home. Very low cloud and a North Easterly were still blowing and visibility was poor but it wasn't quite raining. A large group of hirundines had gathered over the house and trees an estimated 200+ House Martins, 50+ Swallows and at least 2 Sand Martin. Quite an unusual event here. There were birds around and moving through for the first couple of hours, difficult to establish whether these were the same birds swirling around or new ones. Meadow Pipits are more infrequent, the most I've had in a morning this week is 11, so no big movement here yet this autumn. Still a couple of Chiffchaffs around with the odd Blackcap, 2 Firecrest and plenty of Jays stealing the acorns.
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| Swallow |
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| House Martin |
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| More hirundines - difficult to photograph a swirling mass spread out in the sky. |
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