The weather took a turn for the better today, with a high of 24 degrees C this morning! So I sat out for a bit whilst eating lunch, just before popping out to the dentist.
I actually only started my skywatching because I heard 2 Siskin fly over and then noticed 2 Sand Martins over the house, both uncommon species from my garden. So here’s the total for the 15 or so minutes that I was out:
Siskin: 2
Sand Martin: 2
Swift: 27
Goldfinch: 5
Chaffinch: 3
Greenfinch: 1
House Martin: 3
Woodpigeon: 1
Jackdaw: 1
(I don’t count Feral Pigeons or Gulls because so many go over and my notebook isn’t very big)
Quite good numbers of finches, especially with those Siskins as I’ve only recorded them going over once before. But a high number of Swifts about too. I noticed on Twitter that up to 2500 Swifts had been seen over Spurn Head. I don’t know if these are late arrivals or young from this year, or perhaps young from abroad flying over here to feed? I’m sure someone will know.
Anyway, seeing all these Swifts reminded me of one day last year when I was walking around the field. I’d been drawn out by what looked like a large number of hirundines, but it turned out to be pretty much all Swifts. There was hundreds of them, quite low too, gliding about over the field. I can’t really work out what drew them all to the field at once because I don’t remember noticed that many flies about and the field hadn’t been recently harvested so… I can only speculate! Only I don’t know what to speculate. I’m sure someone will know!
I’m hoping it happens again this year so that I can get pictures. When I was out at Kinneil yesterday there was quite a lot of Swifts over the fields there, so perhaps it’s random.
That’s my third blog post of the day so I better go, getting carried away with this new laptop.
Birding with Gus 