She came back! Briefly! It was fantastic to see female Osprey CJ7 back on her nest cam today for a couple of extended periods. She spent some time nest cleaning/tidying and also seemed to be regurgitated a pellet….lovely! We know from other peoples reports that she hasn’t really ventured very far this spring and summer, and wondered if her re-appearance on the nest was related to another Osprey being in the area, but we couldn’t find/see one. We’re now entering prime time (mid July to late Aug) where non-breeding 3-year old Osprey begin heading back to natal areas again to have a good look around before migrating off to Africa, and of course, migrant adults and juveniles will also be arriving soon so keep your eyes peeled if out around the harbour or on our webcam for any new visitors that happen to drop by. As predicated, a wandering heron species, this time, a fine summer plumaged Cattle Egret, appeared on Lytchett Fields and stayed for most of the day, although hiding for most of it. Late July and August see’s heron species from both here in the UK and the near continent leave the breeding colonies and begin wandering/visiting various wetlands. It was late July 2018 that Lytchett Fields had a flock of 7 Great White Egret ‘drop in’ for several minutes before heading off again. Also at Lytchett Fields were 7 Little Ringed Plover, 1 Spotted Redshank, 3 Greenshank, 15 Green Sandpiper and the 1^st Whimbrel of the autumn. Also, at Lytchett Heath 7 Crossbill were still present. At Holme Lane GP the flock of 14 Egyptian Geese were still present and in the Wareham Channel, 3 different Marsh Harrier left the west harbour roost. The Brownsea Lagoon had 16 Black-tailed Godwit and 14 Common Redshank.

Cattle Egret – Lytchett Fields – Ian Ballam

The unsettled weather dropped a few more birds onto Lytchett Fields including a site record total of 15 Little Ringed Plover, also there over the last couple of days have been 17 Green Sandpiper, 1 Spotted Redshank, 1 Greenshank, 30+ Common Redshank, 40+ Lapwing, 50+ Black-tailed Godwit, 2 Curlew, 1 Marsh Harrier, 1 Hobby, 1 Peregrine and 1 Yellow-legged Gull. At Swineham there were 2 Common Sandpiper on the main gravel pit island and 2 Hobby were active over the Slepe Heath, Arne Moors area. Swallow numbers seem very very low around the Poole Harbour area with hardly any being noted in traditional sites, with only 6 individuals logged at Redcliff Yacht Club at Bestwall. There were 26 Common Redshank back on the Brownsea Lagoon today too, which are the first of the autumn returners. A blue ringed Osprey was seen in the dead trees at Middlebere which was assumed to be CJ7 but, we’re all on the look out for our 2018 female 014 who was only in Devon a couple of days ago and has since gone missing from there, along with 200+ Black-tailed Godwit also in Middlebere and a Marsh Harrier yesterday. We also had a lovely encounter on our Osprey nest cam last night when 3 Nightjar (2 males and 1 female) courted on the perching post of the nest, providing a great insight to this normally invisible behaviour.

It was interesting to read today on Twitter that Portland bird Obs caught their first Willow Warbler of the autumn today, which we’re sure will be the first of many. Willow Warblers main passage period is late July and early August with most having gone through already by the latter part of August. This capture today means young birds are already on the move so it’s worth keeping an eye out in Long-tailed Tit flocks throughout July (and over the next week or two) as ‘Lottie’ flocks are a typical carrier species for migrating passerines such as Willow Warbler and Chiffchaff. This time of year provides a great opportunity to learn a different call type between Willow Warbler and Chiffchaff which allows you to separate the two on call alone, often without even having to see the bird. In 2006 local Poole based publishing company ‘The Sound Approach’ published their first title ‘The Sound Approach to birding’. This award winning title introduces bird song to it’s reader in a manageable and easy to understand format, allowing you to get your head around what can quite often be a challenging topic. Recently the Sound Approach team uploaded their titles onto their website as free ‘Web-Books, and in Chapter 2 of ‘The Sound Approach to birding’ they provide an excellent breakdown and example of the two calls made by both adult and juvenile Willow Warbler and Chiffchaff on autumn migration. Click on the link below to have a read up on this topic. (We highly recommend reading the rest of the book too)!!!!

https://soundapproach.co.uk/put-it-all-together-and-what-have-you-got/

Well, we haven’t had our first migrating Willow Warbler here yet in the harbour, but up on Ballard there were several Common Swift leaving SW out to sea which suggested some of these are already on their way out of here. Also, the BTO Cuckoo tagging project also showed some of their tagged male Cuckoo’s were seen leaving the UK yesterday with one, ‘Valentine’ already almost down in Southern France! At Lytchett Fields there were still 11 Little Ringed Plover, 1 Spotted Redshank, 1 Greenshank, 2 Common Sandpiper and 2 Green Sandpiper with a single Dunlin on the rising tide. On Slepe Heath a Hobby was hunting over the mire and 8 Stonechat were counted. Stonechat seem to have had an excellent season with many juveniles on all the local heathlands. Crossbill were logged at Lytchett Heath (5), Rempstone Forest (7) and Greenlands Farm (4). It’s also worth mentioning that July is the time to keep an eye out for ‘moving’ herons of all species and with the increased breeding numbers of Cattle Egret in the UK, dispersing juveniles from elsewhere in the country could soon be joining our local Little Egrets in various roosts. Take note that juvenile Cattle Egret have black bills like Little Egret, so can be over-looked quite easily.

Silver-studded Blue Butterfly – Hartland Moor

Pretty grim today, but bad weather often forces down migrating birds, and today highlighted that. The Lytchett Fields Little Ringed Plover flock rose from 4 to 8 which for early July is a good total. Just outside the recording area a group of 10 Common Sandpiper were on Peveril Point, Swanage with another 3 Common Sandpiper on Seymers, Brownsea. Also at Lytchett Fields was the Spotted Redshank, 1 Greenshank, 6 Green Sandpiper, 30+ Redshank, 81 Black-tailed Godwit, 1 Yellow-legged Gull and lots of juv Reed Warbler are beginning to appear. Over in Rempstone Forest a party of 11 Crossbill flew over and at Greensland’s Farm a Red Kite was seen. Female Osprey CJ7 was again seen out over the Wareham Channel in between the poor spells of weather and at Holes Bay a roost of 37 Little Egret were counted. In the PC World Drain, there were 6 Blackcap and 12 Chiffchaff, all mostly juveniles.

Black-tailed Godwit – Lytchett Fields

It wasn’t a bad day in the end, although the wind did build quite substantially. Female Osprey CJ7’s behaviour is interesting at the moment, as she’s taken to sitting on channel markers out in the Wareham Channel (rather American like) before going fishing elsewhere in the harbour. This morning she was on a marker in the mouth of Frome before heading off towards the Middlebere Wytch Lake area to catch a fish before heading off towards Wareham Forest. At Lytchett Fields there were more signs of autumn passage getting underway with 4 Little Ringed Plover, however, 3 of them were juveniles, which means a newly arrived juvenile had a arrived in from somewhere. This new bird seemed incredibly ‘fresh’ in terms of it’s juvenile plumage suggesting this too could have been raised somewhere local?? Also, the autumns first Greenshank returned onto the fields, and also present were 1 Spotted Redshank, 3 Green Sandpiper, 74 Black-tailed Godwit, 44 Redshank, c30 Lapwing and c15 Teal. More Crossbill were heard flying over with 8 over Slepe Heath/Hartland and c15 over Greenlands on the edge of Rempstone.

Newly arrived ‘fresh’ Little Ringed Plover – Lytchett Fields – Shaun Robson

Juvenile Lapwing – Lytchett Fields