Thursday 15 June 2023

Bully's Special Prize

 Yes indeedy, it was as if Jim Bowen himself had knocked on the door to tell me a cracking male bullfinch was in the apple tree calling away! I could scarcely believe me ears, but luckily went to check what was calling like a bullfinch, only to see it mere metres away! Unbelievable! Certainly haven't had bullfinch in summer before - we got the odd autumnal one every few years so great to jam in on one today!


Tuesday 6 June 2023

Okay May

 A nice spell of easterlies at the beginning of the month brought in a fine selection of migrants including: garden warbler, lesser whitethroat, pied fly and a redstart.  No rares but quality patch birds and the first time since 2014 that all four of these have occurred in the same year.

Garganey are always a bonus bird on patch and a nice drake on the 17th made it three years on the trot this species has turned up on the Not So Great Pool. However Bird of the Month must go to the only full fat patch of the year so far with a finely plumed LITTLE EGRET appearing briefly on the Not So Great Pool on 12 May.

A total of 17 patch ticks this month contributing to 13% of the annual total is pretty much average.  Finishing the month on 94 species and 78.14%.

June should quieten things down with an average of just 2 patch ticks this month... but who knows.

Happy days

Bushveld