Close-up Daffy

Crikey - two posts in a week.

Daffy showed better today than ever before and appears to be........a Common Scoter. Nice close Surfie too. Still need to sort out the score,

Statto

Something to shout about

Despite last-minute stats collation in readiness for the World Cup, that's no excuse for the radio-silence of late. But tonight I have something to shout about - a Hobby - first full-fat patch tick of the year. And, better still, Daffy Duck is back :-)

Cue well dodgy photos...

Will catch up with and update the list soon.

Statto

Come on, come on, do the locustella with me

FFS - Boghall has been dire of late. Garden warblers are lacking this year, no swifts yet and no house martins either. Things were looking grim, but just got grimmer with a wee flock of feral greylag flying about the place. I could do without that kind of thing. But I did notch up a grasshopper warbler the other day there, which brings us to 66 or 70.21% (all things are relative after all).

Plodding on towards the ton!

Haven't been on here for a while as nothing really interesting has been happening on patch. That said a couple of "bankers" have turned up since last time I posted -- a couple of swifts over the lake, VERY distant gannet from the one elevated section of patch with a sliver of sea visible, and finally the a late-returning spotted fly.

Which brings the tally to 96.05%

That's a good thing... because I'll be leaving the patch from the end of July until early December. That's right... I'm going to miss the Autumn. Yikes!

A raptorous day!

Last Monday I watched a falcon. It was about 600 metres away and it was flying like a hobby, it looked like a hobby and I thought that it probably was a hobby.  But the views weren't great and there's kestrels nesting near to where this hobby was, so I didn't count it.

Today, there was a hobby, it was about 50 metres away, it flew like a hobby, looked like a hobby and was a hobby.  So I ticked it.

Bird of they year so far.

My first sea watch of the year produced the expected Sarnie terns but now't else.  However, two new birds for the year aint so bad.

Now, when deciding upon the patch boundaries, there's an area to the south-west which is largely just fields, but then so is the rest of the patch.  I, for some random reason which I have long since forgotten, decided not to include it in the patch as it was unlikely to get any birds and should the land owner ever find you on his land he was liable to shoot you.  Such is the way of the gentile folk up in this neck of woods.

BUGGER…

As I was driving away from the patch a honey buzzard flew past me at about head height and about 20 metres away.  Would have been well and truly on patch if I'd included that left out south-west corner.  Even after the fastest u-turn ever many in the history of  Landy Defenders and top speed back the 500 m onto the patch I couldn't relocate the bird.

but still it was a honey buzzard… which is pretty damn good.

must revisit those boundaries at the end of this year!

Anyway...total increased by two.

and frustratingly 66.92% and behind Seppy

arse

Happy days

Bushveld.

Alas poor bushveld...

OK spring has generally been pants at Galley but did manage to add sarnie tern, spot fly and blackcap over last weekend so still just ahead of bushy!

Also managed to tick a cracking (unringed) male blue-winged teal the other night - just off patch but ya can't have everything!

Happy days!

0.10%

Yesssss

A storming three species since my last posting with house martin (ok i forgot about them), corn bunting (an increasingly rare bird and not one I'll likely get very often in the future) and a migrant spot fly. pulls me a head of Seppy by a whopping 0.10%.

85 species
65.38%

...awesome

Happy days

Bushveld