Back In The Saddle At Last

It was great to be back in the saddle and be fit enough to get back out birding. This bout of man flu has proved to me that if there is a God then they must be female to inflict such a debilitating condition on all us poor men folk! I was back in the saddle, but it's a pity that the weather wasn't playing ball this morning. I had a few false starts with the rain before I finally got out mid-morning after a call from Ian saying that there were a few migrants around at the Obs; Gropper, Goldcrest and Redstart as 'starters for ten'.

This surprised me a little, as it did Ian, because the wind direction was northwesterly and to be honest with you, had it been p*ssing down like it was this morning but in October with an easterly I would have been out there in the rain!

The rain did finally stop and I headed to the coastal scrub to have a quick look round and also to trim some net rides for tomorrow morning. I didn't spend too long looking for grounded migrants as it was mid-morning and the trespassing dog owners were on the move. There's signs everywhere telling them not to trespass with their dogs, but for some reason it doesn't apply to them! As I have said a million times before on here it would seem that if you have a dog you can go wherever you like!!!

I walked along the main hedge and ditch and had a couple of juv. Whitethroats and then after a bit of pishing a cracking juv. Garden Warbler popped into view. Next up were a couple of Foxes and then the first of four Sparrowhawks for the morning. I had two migrants thermalling high and drifting south and then I had a third migrant Sparrowhawk in the form of a female thermalling high and again drifting south. Sparrowhawk number four was a little juv. male that was a delight to watch as it 'worked' the hedgerow.

 Whitethroat

 Fox

That was it for migrants and I got on with the task in hand of trimming some net rides; fingers crossed for some decent weather in the morning! 

 Speckled Wood