When Pigs Fly

When they do I will no doubt get a patch tick. These little fellows have just moved into the Waterworks N.R. thus moving further from N.R. to Z.O.O. Maybe it’s a good thing, what with Horses and Cows on the marsh we could be about to attract things that like Pigs...Pig Egret? Could be a potential split.

The Waterworks held no surprises; it also held no sign of Mike M’s Wednesday Redstart, mores the pity, though it did hold Mike M. We had a few Teal dropping into the beds, my first of the Autumn. On the marsh proper we had two, probably adult, Whinchats in the bomb crater field, the Kestrels seem to have moved on, thank goodness. A Mistle Thrush was the best of the rest.

Later we moved on to the Lockwood for the late morning Raptor Fest, despite conditions looking promising and despite hearing that 3 Marsh Harriers were heading our way from Hatfield (our Birds from Wednesday?) it proved disappointing on the large raptor front. It made up for it on the small Raptor front with 2 Hobbys soaring to the South and another over the Lockwood, plenty of Sparrowhawk and Kestrel activity and a grey fuzzy blob sitting on the incinerator chimney which later became a Peregrine over our heads, it’s the first time I have seen Peregrine up there since the maintenance work of the late Spring, worth keeping your eyes open as they used to like sitting up there.

A walk around the Lockwood only produced 7 Swifts, about 4 Common Sandpipers, a Wheatear and a couple of Teal, sadly no sign of Kevin’s Spotted Flycatcher from yesterday. Kevin did pull a couple of Whimbrel out of the bag though, they flew steadily, and silently South-west early afternoon.

PW