Time for a Chat

Met up with Mike M on the Waterworks this morning for a chat, he likes a chat you know, but, apart from a Mute Swan in distress, later rescued by the rangers, there was little on there of interest. The marsh however was much better, though strangely nothing on the Horse paddocks, (everyone else is always getting Wheatear and Yellow Wagtail, well perhaps not everyone and not always but certainly more than I do!) but elsewhere two Jackdaws flew East and there were multiple Chiffchaffs and a few Whitethroats and Blackcaps smattered around. A sizeable flock, of c.200 Hirundines over the Filter beds consisted mostly of House Martins with some Sand Martins mixed in.

The Bomb Crater field a.k.a. the Cow field held an impressive group of Whinchat and, even more impressive, a patch year tick, 2 male Stonechats. It was remarkably difficult to count them all as they were spending a lot of time feeding on the ground. One sweep through the field would reveal 5 Birds the next 2 and then 7 etc. After quite a while we counted a clear 9 Whinchat, though it might have been more if there were still some out of sight. A dozen or so Meadow Pipits flitted about and one or two more passed over this morning.

We bumped into Jamie P in the Middlesex F.B. looking for Spotted Flycatcher, my excuse was I was trying to poach it, he didn’t need an excuse, it’s his patch. My plan would have worked too because, if it had been in the right Tree, I could have scoped it from the right side of the Lea, the fly in the ointment was the lack of Fly’ in the Tree. A short chat ensued where I explained my ‘on, over or from’ the patch rule. It was put to the test moments after I left the two of them and wandered back across Hackney marsh, a flock of Siskin bounded low West, fortunately I remembered that I didn’t need them for the year as both I and they were off patch. Must remember to stay on the right side of the Lea, one of these days I will get caught out.

On this date: 14 09 08 A fairly slow visible migration session this morning in the garden; resulted in 4 Meadow Pipits and little else. At 08:10 however an Osprey was seen circling low to the North-west, it didn’t attract much attention from any potential mobbers and went of to the South-west. At 15:50 two birds seen, thermalling, far to the South-west, were possibly Honey Buzzards. At 16:14 a definite mid-phase Honey Buzzard flew straight towards the house from the North, circled and went off South-west.

PW