Midday-ish today. New arrivals were 10 Teal on west lake, together with around 30 Tufted Duck, 2 drake Pochard and a lone eclipse Wigeon. The Heron was in the favoured tree near the main bridge. Annoyingly there were 3 men fishing with hand lines, including the 2 pictured on the kayak launching platform on E lake. The other guy spent some time along the far shore of W lake in the conservation area, and then moved round to the shoreline of E lake. There’s no fishing allowed but there’s no signage to say so!

Cosmeston this morning. A single Whinchat was in the plantation above Sully Brook, together with 2 Stonechat. No pix of these – too distant and flighty. A couple of smart Starlings were feeding on blackberries near the Medieval dovecote. Elsewhere the vocal Buzzard was circling and a Flat Holm ringed juv LBBG [F:F76 blue] was by E lake. At the dipping pond there are still some very small punk – plumaged Moorhen chicks. It seems that a single pair there have had 3 or poss 4 broods this year.

Having missed a lot of migrant activity over the weekend as I was away, I was pleased to catch up with Whinchat [3 of them] at Cosmeston this afternoon, plus a first winter male Redstart, a plumage I’ve not seen before. Superficially it looks like a Stonechat, but the greyish head & mantle, dark smudgy cheeks and rufous ‘springy’ tail are good pointers [although the tail is not well shown in the two px I managed to shoot before it dropped out of view]. The birds were in the sapling plantation above Sully Brook. There were also c.20 Linnet in a tree by the brook.

Not much of interest for me of late although others [who get up earlier than I do!], have had Spotted Flycatcher and Redstart. Yesterday there were no less than 6 ‘Spot Flys’ at the far end of East Paddock! I did catch up with a rather elusive Whinchat by the tree plantation above Sully Brook, on 31st Aug. The only interest this morning was the Grey Heron sitting quite peacefully in a tree near the main bridge, until another arrived and set it off squawking and eventually chasing the intruder off. Other interest yesterday were 5 Tufted Ducks, all in eclipse plumage.

Great excitement yesterday when a juvenile Grey Phalarope was found a the Knap Lake in Barry. We took our morning dog walk there this morning rather than the usual Cosmeston – not surpringly! It was pretty obvious that it was still present when we arrived, due to the row of folk with cameras along the east side of the lake. As is often the case with phalaropes, this tiny wader was incredibly bold and was swimming along the near edge of the lake right next to photographers sitting on the adjacent path. Its tiny size is accentuated in one of my photos below where it is being followed by a Mute Swan. Loads of portrait images have been posted on social media. There’s a few of mine below including two where it moved away from the lake edge to wash and prean.

There’s been a very vocal Buzzard at Cosmeston recently, often up circling with a few others. It was there again this morning calling and drifting towards me and not too high so I prepared for some flight shots. Managed a few which needed some post processing as they were a bit silhouetty. Dead chuffed to get a couple where it was in mid “mew”. Pretty sure it’s a juvenile due to the heavy breast streaking and the pale tips to the upper wing coverts viewable in one of the ‘wing down’ images.

Rather humid outing to the R.Ely floodplain near Peterston-super-Ely this morning, with 18 participants. We scored with the target birds – 6, possibly 8 Green Sandpipers, a new bird for some. They did their usual thing of exploding from their hiding places along the river edge, uttering their characteristic “weet-a-weet-a-weet” call. 26 species were logged on what was a fairly quiet morming bird-wise. The full list [subject to updates] is linked below. A non-avian highlight was the Dark Bush-cricket which is pictured below. The other non-avian shown is one of the common Hoverflies, Eristalis pertinax. A notgable find by Charlotte on the walk back, was a Roesel’s Bush-cricket – apparently a new record for the site – nice one!. John Wilson

PS an image of the Roesel’s is added to the gallery. Cropped phone pic taken by Charlotte.

Here’s the current list: click here

Cosmeston a.m. A Little Egret was resting by the W lake ‘island’ – it was very distant so the pix are rubbish. But pale bill and dull legs seem to point to 1st yr bird. Very vocal large GCG juv was pestering it’s parent. Also a very vocal Green Woodpecker was in the conservation area but I couldn’t see it. There were about 20 Sand Martins over W lake – the first hirundines I’ve seen in the park for about a week. The LBBG was an evil looking brute!

There were c.30 Canada Geese by E lake shore today, presumably having arrived early this morning as they weren’t there yesterday. A Kingfisher flew under the main bridge and disappeared into the trees along the edge of the W lake reed bed. A pair of GC Grebes were with 3 small humbugs there – see photo. Also of note – good numbers of Gatekeepers and a few Common Blues

We had a successful trip to Goldcliff Newport Wetlands today, with 10 participants. There was some work going on but we still logged 50 species. Highlights were Little, Great and Cattle Egrets [singles of the last two with the Cattle Egret being in full breeding plumage]. Waders comprised a nice flock of c.80 Dunlin plus Ringed Plover & Lapwing, and 2 Green Sandpipers. Amongst the duck [all in eclipse plumage now] were a couple of Wigeon, Shoveler, Gadwall, Teal and a Pintail. A female Marsh Harrier flew a couple of times and was then found on the ground plucking a prey item, but we couldn’t figure out what it was, apart from the fact that the pluckings were feathers! John Wilson.
Click here for the full list.
Couple of heavily cropped shots below of the Cattle Egret when it flew off.