Sunday 27 March 2011

Ben Miller's highlights of the day

On Saturday afternoon the long-staying RUFF was still at College Lake around the bund area, plus 2 Oystercatchers and 6+ Redshanks. There was also an LRP in Pitstone Quarry but no charadrius plovers of any sort in a couple of visits to Pitstone Industrial Estate over the weekend. Today started well with one of the widely reported Rouzels on Ivinghoe Beacon. I then dropped down into Tring town to take a quick look at the 30+ WAXWINGS found earlier by Bill Pegram around Ash Road, Tring (thanks for the texts David) - won't be long until the amazing invasion of the 2010/11 winter is just a memory. I then returned home to Berkhamsted when the highlight of the day happened. After putting my little girl down for a nap I walked down into our kitchen, only to see a "female-type" BLACK REDSTART sat on the fence outside! It flicked away, but I soon located it again on the roof tops, at which point it sat on our chimney pot and started singing! So, a 1st-summer male, then. It stayed around the close until 15:00 at least, during which time fellow Berkhamsted resident Ian Williams and his son were able to photograph it, as it showed really well at times and sang often. I then headed back to the ressies hoping for an Osprey, but the best Startops produced was a flock of 6 SAND MARTINS that flew into Bucks and away, and a singing Chiffchaff in the car park (plus the usual RCPs). The hoped-for Osprey was later found end-of-day by David Bilcock fishing over Tringford... Returning home at 17:00 DB, LGRE and I were unable to find the Black Redstart again - no sign until dusk. I'll look for it again in the morning pre-work and will ping an email if this still present. Spring really is here, in all its migration glory!

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