A Night at the Opera - Queen

A Night at the Opera
would have been far preferable to the night in reality,
as there would have been far more birds in the Royal Albert Hall,
which simply didn't come up trumps here!
(Oh yes, Donald just wait until he's ruling the World????)

Details of which will be found in the Epilogue manana.

It would have been a strange occasion indeed if we had arrived behind the
Eco Recycling Works
and not seen all 3 of our most common Large Gulls.

and each, including the largest of the trio,

GREAT BLACK-BACKED GULL

are carting huge clods of mud and vegetation back to the traditional
nest sites atop the buildings at
Bournemouth International Airport.
Unfortunately, since the construction of the new factory there these
nests are now obscured from our view.

HERRING GULL
performing similarly and not to be left out

LESSER BLACK-BACKED GULL

It took a while but finally we found a

 COMMON BUZZARD

before paying a distant visit to what has become the
 New Sand Martin Wall

 SAND MARTIN

 FERAL PIGEON
 is a real 'scarcity' here but we do have just a single resident at Eco.
The first of 4 visits to
MERRITOWN HEATH
during the day and evening started with this

GREENFINCH
(already recorded and reported but just looked right to welcome our arrival?)
and then between here and the Large Solar Panel Compound
shared the rest of the additional species from the day.

MEADOW PIPIT

have been unusually absent, or maybe overlooked,

for the past 10 days so the return, or sighting, of c2

was considered a stroke of

 Good Fortune

hence the prolonged photo/video gallery!

Long, long overdue was

 LINNET
(male)

 LINNET
(female)

SKYLARK

 again luckily to be found in full song.

MERLIN
Undoubtedly the
'Bird of the Day'
but lucky to see and sex it as a male, let along photograph it!
(Drawing from Wiki)

MISTLE THRUSH

feeding young

on an abundance of small green caterpillars.

WHEATEAR

in company with a pristine

WHINCHAT

There has been some chat on

Social Media

as to how fine this species are looking this year.

These images don't tell half of the story

of the most

BEAUTIFUL

bird seen on the day.

Yes, a lot of photos but didn't want to do anything by halves.

In a second and again vane attempt to locate a
Little Ringed Plover
a small pulse of about 200

COMMON SWIFT
flew over the compound heading north

and before we headed for pastures greener to find a

GREY WAGTAIL
back at the Gravel Pit.

Only a single JAY was seen all day.
A sumptuous Roast Dinner at Harbins was followed by our fourth and final visit to
Merritown Heath
which commence at 19:45 and came to an end at 22:00 in the hope of adding
a few 'nocturnals' to the list.
Only yesterday evening we had managed to see or hear 3 along with
a most unexpected addition in the shape of our first for the Heath
Red-legged Partridge.
Not so that evening as already the sky was clouding over bringing
an all to premature gloom to the picture, and soon after matters were made worse
by a heavy drizzle. In all that and just before dark we were blessed with a bonus

SPARROWHAWK
 but the number of

WOODCOCK
were reduced from last night's c7 sightings to just c2.
That brought an end to a most rewarding and long day which,
 even if we could get the camera settings
correct there would be little chance of capturing and image!
(drawing once again from Wiki)
Bearing in mind that our Recording Area is just a Postage Stamp of no more than 2000 acres,
our final day total reached a remarkable and record breaking
69 Species.
This was an increase of 13 on the previous record, so while we could moan all night
about the ones that didn't materialise we went back to
Slight Return II a very Happy Bunny!
 THANKS FOR TUNING IN AND SHARING THE DAY!

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