What's Buzzing or Flying near you today......2016

Marsh Harrier hunting (hawking) along the River Frome at Wareham.

 

Chiffchaff.


Wall Lizard warming itself in the autumn sun.

 

I've just seen a flock of long tails swoop in too plus a coal tit.

 

I haven't had either in the garden for six months or more and we seem to have 'lost' the three Blackbirds.

Bullfinches.





Male Marsh Harrier.




Mmm Ducks! but which one?

 

I've got siskins in this garden....didn't have them in my last one.

 

I had this Goldfinch to keep me company in the garden this afternoon, poking about in the teasels looking for seeds.

 

Pleased with my daughter, she spotted 3 Cattle Egrets at RSPB Marshside on a uni field trip on Friday.

 

Back in 2007/8 there was an influx of over a hundred Cattle Egrets around the country and everyone though it was the start of a colonisation like the Little Egret, unfortunately it hasn't happened (yet) Only one pair has bred since then at Ham Wall in Somerset in 2011 but there are ocassional sightings every year as your daughter has seen. Hopefully they will increase in numbers as it is great to see birds colonising here naturally rather than introduced.

These are three I saw briefly at Radipole RSPB in 2008.

 

There are a couple of Great White Egrets in our county at the moment and normally there are around three of them that overwinter here so it will be interesting to see if they stay again.Also have Little Egrets that stay all year round now but can't remember if any of those have bred this year or not

Been reading one of the birding blogs from a lady in Norfolk and she drove all the way to Easington in Yorkshire on Friday to a school along with thousands of other twitchers to see a Siberian Accentor which is a 2nd for the UK

Would love to see it but couldn't face the long drive up there plus having to queue for nearly an hour to get ten minutes of observation.Knowing our luck it would either have been eaten by a Sparrowhawk by the time we got to it or would have got fed up with the lines of telescopes eyeballing it and cleared off back to where it came from.

It would have been a good tick though

 

Same here @Kandy a Red Eyed Vireo blown over from N America was caught in the mist nets at Portland Bird Obs a couple of days ago but it was ringed, measured and released immediately and was not seen again so I wasn't going to looking! The week before a rare Blyths Reed Warbler was caught in the same nets!

Two Great Whites are also here in Poole Harbour and may well stay here for the winter

Quite a number of Ring Ouzels and Yellow Browed Warblers are here along the coast passing through on their way to the Med/Morocco but I haven't managed to see either!!

 

@strongylodon we saw our one and only Red Eyed Vireo when we had a birdwatching holiday down on the Scillies in the 80's when we had print film cameras so don't think we even got a photo of it Also got the Yellow Browed Warbler there as well

We know what you mean about trying to go after stuff.When we were down in Somerset a few weeks back the Dalmatian Pelican that is over here was way down in Cornwall and kept moving around and Mr Kandy said he wasn't going to chase it.The week we came home it moved up near Barnstable so we could have gone to see it but now it has eaten all the fish has gone back to the River Camel near Wadebridge Would also have liked to see the Purple Swamp Hen up near Scunthorpe as it has come up from France due to drought conditions and likes our English frogs legs

We should get some Rouzels and Northern Wheatears up at our old Airfield now that the farmer has resown his fields.

 

Can't really make out the Masonry Bees in this shot, there were dozens of them, but you can see the darker patches of the spoil they'd been digging out.

 

More Avocets.