Local Wildlife Sightings September 2022

  Apologies for the very sporadic nature of my sightings: this has been due to a combination of circumstances - hopefully, things will be back to normal by October. 

We finally had an 'unsettled' period of weather in the first ten days of September, with more rain (30mm) falling than in the whole of July and August combined. The weather turned much cooler too, although it was still pleasantly warm during this early period. Butterfly numbers inevitably dropped off, although Adonis blues were still present in decent numbers at both ends of The Heath during the first half of the month. Perhaps the commonest butterfly during this period was the speckled wood, which always seems to be far more abundant in our area during the early autumn than it is in the spring. Small heath butterflies were also quite common.

I turned my attention more towards grasshoppers, bush crickets, bugs and spiders later in the month. Three bush crickets (long winged conehead, Roesel's bush cricket and dark bush cricket) were seen on the field adjoining my estate and a Roesel's bush cricket was also photographed on Church Hill.

Female Roesel's Bush-cricket, Therfield Heath, 6 September

Bird sightings picked up noticeably during the second week as migrants started to pass through our area on southbound migration in good numbers. Although I missed out (again) on a pied flycatcher seen nearby (David Hatton) as well as redstarts, I did see (and photograph!) the notoriously skulking lesser whitethroat on the 12th, when I also saw willow warbler, blackcaps and around 25 chiffchaffs on a walk up the Icknield Way and on to The Heath.

A 'bright' Chiffchaff (I think!), Royston, 12 September

Lesser Whitethroat, Royston, 12 September

Male Blackcap, Royston, 12 September

Numbers of ivy bees continued to increase towards the end of the month - thank goodness they don't sting! They have a peculiar habit of resting on leaves close to ivy plants and appearing to wipe their bodies against the leaves - are they cleaning themselves of excess pollen?

Two Ivy Bees, Royston, 29 September

After a holiday break (I will write a separate post about this) I returned to find that most of the passage migrant birds had moved on, although a few chiffchaffs remained to the end of the month. Winter visitors, in the form of lapwings, common and black-headed gulls, were back in the area, but generally things were pretty quiet.

UK Wildlife Sightings September 2022

 On the 1st I visited RSPB Frampton Marsh, hoping to see the pectoral sandpiper that had been present for a few days. Unfortunately, it wasn't around, but I was able to add a juvenile little stint (the first of a large influx of little stints here) to my year list. Several curlew sandpipers were also seen. Unfortunately, the visitor centre and some of the tracks were closed whilst re-development work took place, so I wasn't able to look for dragonflies on the west of the site.

Curlew Sandpiper, Frampton Marsh, 1 September

Ruff, Frampton Marsh, 1 September

Common Snipe, Frampton Marsh, 1 September

On the 7th I took myself off for a bird watching trip to the Norfolk coast - always an enjoyable experience. Arriving at Sheringham at 8.40am, hoping to see some seabirds on passage, I found a flat, calm sea and only one other person in the shelter. Fortunately for me he turned out to be an expert and was able to pick out Arctic, great and pomarine skuas, sometimes at great distance, and point them out to me on what could fairly be described as a 'quiet' day for seabird passage. The pomarine skua (a juvenile) later put on a somewhat closer show as it chased a gull, and I was able to pick out a few of its distinguishing features - in particular, the double pale bar on the undersides of the wings. I decided not to pursue the wryneck at Kelling (just as well, as it had disappeared overnight) or the hooded crow at Warham Greens but headed for Titchwell where I again saw little stints on the freshmarsh, this time much closer than the bird at Frampton. and newly arrived bar-tailed godwits amongst the waders on the beach (I saw 16 species of wader, including whimbrel and spotted redshank, on the day). Willow emerald damselflies, which used to be extremely rare in the UK but are now getting quite common, were seen (and photographed) all over the reserve.

Golden Plovers on the Freshmarsh, RSPB Titchwell Marsh, 7 September

Juvenile Little Stint, RSPB Titchwell Marsh, 7 September

Willow Emerald Damselfly, RSPB Titchwell Marsh, 7 September

My partner and I spent the weekend of the 9-11th based at Deal in Kent. It wasn't a bird watching weekend, but I did have one interesting sighting - a juvenile cuckoo that was catching insects below the cliffs at Margate. No doubt it was feeding up before the long and dangerous flight to its winter quarters in Africa.

Juvenile Cuckoo, Margate, 11 September

I led an RSPB coach trip to Rye Harbour (East Sussex) on the 18th. In preparation for the trip, and since I hadn't been there for several years, I did a 'recce' on the 14th. A splendid new visitor centre, with cafe, has been constructed in my absence, and the volunteer manning the reception desk was very informative. On the reserve I saw 59 species during a five-hour visit. It should have taken four hours, but I deviated somewhat into the marshes and reached a dead end, although not before seeing all three of our naturalised egrets (little, cattle and great) on the same lake! A huge number of southbound migrants, particularly wheatears, yellow wagtails, swallows and meadow pipits, were coming through. Warblers included willow warbler and lesser whitethroat. Chiffchaffs seemed to be in every tree, and some were doing 'flycatcher' impressions. Sadly, I saw none of the real thing, but I did find three redstarts (always a treat) on the way round. The RSPB trip itself went off well, with 81 species being seen on the day by our Local Group members. Highlights (most of which I missed) included merlin, great skua, spoonbill, rock pipit and Mediterranean gull.

Redstart, Rye Harbour SWT Reserve, 14 September

I have mentioned Dernford Farm Reservoir, near Sawston in Cambridgeshire, before. It takes me less than 20 minutes to drive there and has produced some good birds this year. On the 15th news came out that a pectoral sandpiper was showing there. When I arrived, there was hardly any water left in the reservoir (of course the farmer uses the water to irrigate his fields and it has also been a baking hot summer), so there was plenty of mud - ideal for waders. The sandpiper (a juvenile) was associating with a juvenile ruff, maybe 150 metres from the shore. A telescope was needed to pick out the key features of this bird. I took a few 'record' photos of the bird, one of which is shown below. Eight 'Scandinavian' ringed plovers were also present.

'Record Shot' of Juvenile Pectoral Sandpiper, Dernford Farm Reservoir, 15 September

A bird watching holiday in Batumi (separate blog post), followed by transport problems, meant that there was nothing to report after the 18th.