Nobody's Fault but Mine - Led Zeppelin

BLUE-NAPED CHLOROPHONIA

 (Colombia 2010)

With the Readership dwindling even further (nobody’s fault but mine) we came up with the idea of a ‘Bird of the Week’ image each Sunday to get things going with this being the first even though it’s only Thursday. Despite not having a pessimistic bone in our body reality spells the end of the Blog before the end of the year - we will wait to see!

You can only lead your horse to the Water!

After yet another and short lacklustre rounds on our home turf we had to try other measures to fill today;s post so toddled off to Longham Lakes again in hopes! There we found little difference by way of species but numbers in some cases had increased since our last visit with one new addition. We hadn't got through the gate before the first

GREAT WHITE EGRET
flew overhead

and later found there was an additional single

taking the day count to 5.
At the same spot c3

EGYPTIAN GEESE

were the new additions to the

species count of the

previous visit while the

GREAT CRESTED GREBE

count appeared to be the same.
Interesting to note some of the plumage differences among the

BLACK-HEADED GULLs

with almost full black-caps of the adults

and far less so with the juvenile which we attempted to video

before the 'camera hog' backed in.
Continuing with the Gulls there had been a marked increase in

COMMON GULL

numbers

while those of the humble

HERRING GULL
remained static as we could only find this single juvenile on the day.

The largest increase of all fell to the

COOT

with numbers having increased 10 fold but no change in the numerous

TUFTED DUCK

LITTLE EGRET
while as far as we could tell the

STONECHAT
remains as a singleton.
Finally, we add this clip of another

GREAT WHITE EGRET
but as much for the short vocal outburst of a
Cetti's Warbler.

and still awaiting the first Moth of Late Winter!

Hazy Shade of Winter - Simon and Garfunkle

For the sake of continuity all Moth records are dated from the evening on which the Traps are fired up so, by the time we post this the traps of the First Day of the Month are as yet to be attended.

It is on such a day, the first of the month, that in the past we would have undertaken a Day Twitch, that is to say race around intending to see as many species as possible within our patch but the number of Moths has put paid to that but we may resurect on New Year's Day? Otherwise this Post does reprsent the first day of the month except for the Moths which are the late residue from November!

There was no surprise as to the first Bird of tis end of the Winter, in fact we had been waiting for it, as having seen and heard them a couple or 3 weeks ago across the northern section, that it should have been the ‘chacking’ of a number of

FIELDFARE

in the riverside Ash trees that should herald both the New Month and New Season.

However, you won't be seeing the likes of this in Dorset or even the rest of
Great Britain - nesting Fieldfare Estonia 2010.

A misty start at daybreak which took some time to clear with the

OLD CURRENT BUN
being hampered by low cloud eventually opened up to a few Moths

CHESTNUT

RED-GREEN CARPET

FEATHERED THORN
along with another

SATTELITE
surely we are getting close to the end of it?
Had we been carrying out a Twitch we would certainly have capitalised at the
Irrigation Pond with a 'hat-trick of goodies with a new pair of

TUFTED DUCK

female
and

male
the first and vocal

CETTI'S WARBLER
at this location during 2020 and the continuing and equally vocal

WATER RAIL
and another welcome suprise, after an absence of a couple or 3 weeks,
suddenly and restricted to the south east corner of the Heath and close to the Rare Breed Goats Enclosure maybe as many as a dozen each of

STONECHAT

and

DARTFORD WARBLER
some clinging on to juvenile plumage and

with the hopes of them over-wintering here!