We’re sure you’ve all seen enough photos of the ‘Dorset Lights’ from last night, and if you managed to experience it, then good work….what a treat! The sun then rose this morning which led into another fine, bright, hot day with a few highlights but nothing as spectacular as lasts nights light show. Best from today was a new adult Little Gull on the Lower Piddle Floods which accompanied the 1st winter thats been present for several weeks, The floods also held 37 Little Egret, 1 Cattle Egret, 5 sum plum Grey Plover, 3 Knot, c100 Black-tailed Godwit, 3 Greenshank and 2 Bar-tailed Godwit. At dawn there were counts made of 87 Reed Warbler , 24 Cetti’s Warbler & 7 Sedge Warbler plus 14 Reed Bunting. At RSPB Arne, an Osprey was seen from Middlebere along with 2 Red Kite. 

Little Gull – Lower Piddle Floods – Garry Hayman

What another perfect day, which started off with a perfect new set of experiences for us from our Up with the Lark cruise this AM. With the cruise focusing more on bird song and bird sound today, the flat calm conditions and still weather allowed for sound travel perfectly across the water which peaked when the White-tailed Eagle pair flew across the Wareham Channel and landed in a tree close to the boat and started duet calling with one another. Despite many, many sightings over the years, we’ve never actually heard them calling to one another, so it was a blissful experience to be in the presence of this sound, with a boat full of equally thrilled guests. The cruise then continued and logged an Osprey, which looked to be the un-ringed male from recent days, whilst the reed beds were busy with Reed and Cetti’s Warbler. A few Grey Plover were on the RSPB Arne shorelines and there were 2 Ringed Plover in the mouth of the Frome. A Little Gull was on the Brownsea Lagoon, there were 3 Whimbrel, 1 Ringed Plover and a Red Kite over Lytchett Fields. On the Lower Piddle Floods this evening the Little Gull was around again and a good haul of waders were logged with 3 sum plum Grey Plover, 10+ Ringed Plover, 1 Bar-tailed Godwit and 3 Knot. 

We apologise for yesterday’s sightings not appearing, but for some reason they didn’t upload?! Anyway, to catch up, there were 6 Ruff (including 2 breeding plum males) on the Lower Piddle Floods with the Bonaparte’s Gull still. Hobby, Red Kite, Osprey and a reported fly over Common Crane were all noted at Carey Secret Garden and the White-tailed Eagle pair were in the Wareham Channel at dawn.

Finally, we received some great news this evening that our 3-year old male Osprey, ‘374’ who arrived back on April 19th, but hadn’t been seen since, was photographed today at Fishlake Meadows in Romsey, Hampshire. This is brilliant as we were beginning to get worried about his whereabouts. As the Osprey fly’s, this is only about 30 miles from Poole Harbour, so there’s a good chance we may see him back again soon, hopefully adopting the nest platform he settled on last year.

Female White-tailed Eagle G466 from Up with the Lark Cruise this AM

Facebook post of 374’s appearance at Fishlake Meadows – Robin Pascal

Another fine day with settled conditions saw breeding birds now getting into a rhythm and finding their voices. The House Martin colony at Frenches Farm, Lytchett Bay finally got round to nest building and were mud gathering in the SANG car park at Frenches Farm and a Spotted Flycatcher was along the lane leading down to Lytchett Fields. A Little Gull was on the Brownsea Lagoon and there are now 155 Sandwich Tern nests on the breeding islands. An un-ringed male Osprey was in Middlebere this afternoon and both White-tailed Eagles were in the Wareham Channel. Late news, the Forster’s Tern was seen at Shipstal Beach yesterday at RSPB Arne.

House Martin gathering mud – Frenches Farm – Lytchett Fields

House Martin gathering mud – Frenches Farm – Lytchett Fields

What a stunner of a day, with 20 degree’s registering on the car dashboard thermometers. This got the dragonflies and damselflies active, and therefore the Hobby’s too as they sought after a much needed meal after a couple of damp days. There were 3 active over Hartland Moor, 2 over Hyde’s Heath, RSPB Arne and 2 in the Piddle Valley. A Great White Egret was at Holmebridge with a Marsh Harrier over there too and 9 Red Kite. The White-tailed Eagle pair were on Shag Looe in the Wareham Channel, before then being seen over Swineham where there was also a Little Ringed Plover. This morning we surveyed the gull islands in the Wareham Channel for the Black-headed and Mediterranean Gulls. This mornings survey was an on foot survey, carried out under license and on Thursday morning we’ll be carrying out an official drone survey of the same colony to compare which set of data yields the best results whilst causing the least amount of disturbance. We’ll update on this when we get the full results. There were Cuckoo’s at Lytchett Fields, Hyde’s Heath, the Wareham Channel and the Brownsea Lagoon. There was also a Garden Warbler at Lytchett Fields and the 12 Whimbrel remained in the field at Sunnyside. This evening we hosted our first Puffin Cruise of the season which yielded 3-4 Puffin at Dancing Ledge, with the trip between Old Harry and Dancing Ledge producing c15 Kittiwake, c10 Gannet, 4 Fulmar c1000 Guillemot, c10 Razorbill and several small groups of Swallow arriving in off the sea.

Puffin – Dancing Ledge – Michael Caponi

The settled weather bedded in today, which despite the cloud and drizzle felt nice and mild. Many birds are now back and a river-side census along the Frome carried out by patch birder Peter Moore logged 79 Reed Warbler, c25 Cetti’s Warbler and 8 Sedge Warbler. The Little Gull was also still on the Lower Piddle floods with 2 Little Ringed Plover plus c30 Dunlin, 1 Ringed Plover, c50 Black-tailed Godwit and 2 White-tailed Eagle went over Swingham. The Bonaparte’s Gull appeared in the Lower Piddle Valley later in the day. In Bramble Bush Bay 2 Little Tern along with 4 Sanderling, 8 Bar-tailed Godwit, 15 Turnstone, 1 Ringed Plover and 7 Dunlin. At Lytchett Fields an Osprey was watched briefly and there was another (probably 022) fishing in the Wytch Channel. At Rock Lea View, Lytchett Bay 2 Red Kite passed over and 3 Whimbrel were in the bay, at at Middlebere there was 1 Cuckoo, 4 Whimbrel and 1 Marsh Harrier.

Whimbrel – Middlebere – John Thorpe

A beautiful Spring Safari Cruise late this afternoon provided not one but two fishing Osprey in the Wareham Channel! The first bird appears to have been our breeding male 022, who despite limited shallow water on the low tide was able to expertly catch a medium sized fish and took off quickly in the direction of the nest site. Once the tide had risen a little higher a second bird then appeared, but was seemingly still struggling to catch after five or six failed dives, each of which producing little more than an almighty splash of water as it hit the surface and emerged empty taloned. This apparent inexperience indicates that this was not one of our breeding pair, but rather a newcomer or younger individual. This would also add up with a sighting in Lytchett Bay this morning of a ringed male Osprey hunting whilst 022 was incubating the eggs on the livestream nest. Our hope is that this other male is translocated 3-year-old 374 who arrived back almost three weeks ago but who has not been seen since. Young, unpaired Ospreys are very nomadic and often revisit many of the same sites they frequented in previous years to look for food and potential mates. Given that we know 374 made it as far as East Sussex on his travels last year, perhaps its not unreasonable to think that he has been off exploring all this time and has only just returned to the harbour again. We’ll be keeping close eye out in the coming days for any ringed birds, and if it is him we’re sure he’ll put in another appearance on an artificial nest before long.

Other highlights from the cruise were 2 Marsh Harrier, 5 Swift, 30 Sand Martin, 8 Reed Warbler, 6 Whimbrel, 7 Dunlin, and 200 Black-tailed Godwit in the Wareham Channel, plus 3 Bar-tailed Godwit, 8 Knot and 2 Avocet on the Brownsea Lagoon amongst the cacophony of Common Tern, Sandwich Tern and Black-headed Gulls.

Elsewhere the Bonaparte’s Gull was back in the lower Piddle Valley, and on the South Purbeck coast a Pomarine Skua was seen tracking east. There have also been reports of Swifts returning to their nesting sites in parts of Poole: don’t forget to add your nesting Swift sightings to Swift Mapper!

Sandwich Tern – Spring Safari Cruise – Adrian Dutt

With a period of settled weather forecast for the week ahead, the thoughts of warmer weather and more birds arriving over the bank holiday weekend hopefully make for a pleasant few days. It felt good again today, with the Swineham/Lower Piddle Valley area producing the goods with the Bonaparte’s Gull present this morning and the Little Gull and Garganey present all day, plus 1 Spotted Redshank, 4 Greenshank and 1 Cattle Egret also on the floods. The Swineham area also had c30 Swift around this morning and c50 House Martin, c200 Sand Martin and c100 Swallow this afternoon. An Osprey was seen catching a fish in the Wareham Channel around 4pm, and was thought to be male 022 and the White-tailed Eagle pair were seen flying high over Lytchett Bay with another (thought to be a juv) seen flying west over Sandbanks and Brownsea this morning. Hobby were seen over Arne, there was a single Common Sandpiper in Middlebere and at the harbour entrance Whimbrel were seen arriving in through the harbour entrance at dawn with flocks of 18, 9 and 6 recorded, along with the Lesser Whitethroat that’s still singing next to the Shell Bay car park.

Peregrine Falcon – Carey Secret Garden – Alison Copland

Still pretty chilly and overcast today, but the Forster’s Tern fishing in Holes bay NW off the Upton CP shoreline brightened things up a tad. Also a new drake Garganey arrived in at Swineham, being located on the scrape north of the GP where the Bonaparte’s Gull and Little Gull were still present. A great count of 24 Reed Warbler were logged from around the fringes of Holes Bay and there were 2 Common Whitethroat still in the PCW Drain. There were up to 3 White-tailed Eagle in the Wareham Channel, Frome Valley area and a Hobby was over Slepe Heath.

Distant record shot of drake Garganey – Lower Piddle Floods – Peter Moore