In-Viz Mig!

'Tis the season to start viz migging. Viz, as in visible and Mig, as in migration. I am sure someone will correct me but I think the whole thing started during WWII. Pre-Radar people started watching the skies to report incoming Nazi planes and no doubt found (at the appropriate season) that they were seeing quite a bit of avian migration, the growing Bird Observatory movement in the 50's continued on the practice and it carried on from there with occasional lulls and revivals, it seems to have gained a bit of momentum in London in recent autumns.

Generally the first you know of an approaching Viz. Mig. is when you hear it, so Aud.(ible) Mig. would probably be more appropriate. I have a factory and a school/building site behind the house which are surprisingly noisy but I thought that a Saturday morning might not be too bad, think again! There was definitely no Migging, nothing was Viz and certainly there was no Aud.

Surely Sunday will be quieter.

Lol and I checked, very thoroughly, Walthamstow Marsh this afternoon for all the drift migrants (is that Drif. Mig?) that are streaming into the country at the moment. A Redstart had been reported from the patch recently so surely there was at least another one of those or a Flycatcher to be found. Well to say the least Passerines were thin on the ground.

I mentioned that we would be unlucky not to get a large Raptor today and within 5 minutes all the Gulls went up from the Filter Beds, it certainly felt like something had spooked them and shortly afterwards Lol picked up a Buzzard sp. We did our very best to make it something better than the Common that it was, but it just didn't scream Honey. Later an adult Hobby made it a 4 Raptor day. Later still we called it a day.

PW