Saturday August 9

With ex-hurricane Bertha on the way it seemed sensible to switch my birding day to this morning. Sunny and only a light westerly breeze. Unlike last weekend, plenty of Warblers were zipping through the bushes. Seeing them properly was a bit of a problem though. While I was chasing after the first of several possible Lesser Whitethroats I came upon a more significant species in terms of the Morton Bagot year. A Willow Warbler.

When I first started birding in the Midlands 30 + years ago, this species was everywhere and easy to see. Over the years they have definitely got scarcer and whilst I would admit that Morton Bagot doesn't contain classic Willow Warbler habitat, I suspect it used to be commoner here too. This year has been particularly bad. I recorded just a single bird singing on one April date in spring, and didn't even see it. So today's migrant was the second of the year, and the first I have actually seen.

All this explains why I considered it to be sufficiently scarce to require a photo for the year list...no matter how bad it was.

90. Willow Warbler

 All I can say in my defence is that it looked better in the scope. I managed two shots, and unfortunately it was preening when my finger hit the shutter for the better of the two. (Its head was behind a leaf for the first). Check out the primary projection, about the only ID feature showing.

The rest of the walk round produced just the usual stuff. At least five young Whitethroats showed well, with a family party of Yellowhammers in the same bushes.

Whitethroat

The Flashes contained 13 Green Sandpipers, two Snipe, 11 Teal, 70 Lapwings and over 100 Greylag Geese. There was no sign of the Shoveler though.

On the way back I finally got a shot of one of several Brown Hawkers. They seem to be having a good year.

The only other things worth mentioning are that there were a few Black-headed Gulls heading south, about 10 in all, and a second female Tufted Duck now has a brood (of one duckling) this time on the pool west of the flash.