After a recount I realised I had hit 100 in the previous month, whoops!
It's been a much quieter month on the surface, you could have been forgiven for thinking it's deserted at first glance, especially in the heat! A lot of the breeding passerines have staryed to calm down post season (even the Cettis have stopped calling as much!), but there is still activity to be found once you scratch beneath the surface, and I totalled 61 species for June with a bit of work.
The Goldfinches seem to have taken over once more, they are very common in the area and have had a few good years now but they seem to be the most abundant of the small birds on site right now, at the very least they're the most obvious, singing from every perch. I didn't manage to find a single Stonechat this month, with the finches essentially replacing them on their usual telephone wires.
The main scrape on Botany Marsh has totally dried out in the midmonth heat wave, what impact this has remains to be seen. The wildfowl that could be seen there have presumably gone over to Black Duck, although Interestingly I did pick up my first Lapwing since January next to the empty pool. Despite the risks of predation they apparently do breed here but the lack of sightings this year may well mean they have used other areas this time. This may go some way to explain the predatory Black Backed Gulls that gathered at the start of Spring but now are sparcely seen. Hopefully the fledgling geese have managed to relocate successfully too, although the Canadas seem to have done another disappearing act.
Im expecting the departure of breeders over the next little while, with maybe some arrival of nonbreeding birds, which will be interesting to see, particularly upclose when ringing and the telltale signs (eg lack of a brood patch) are apparent.
I had a particularly successful morning with Terry, ringing 50 birds including a lot of juveniles, and it's fascinating to see some of the features that help age birds when the plumage isn't always obvious.
That session was capped off by a brilliant flyover Red Kite, my favourite UK bird and a personal first for the site, and of course it was on the day I didn't have my camera!
We should see some of the earlier migrants like Sand Martins start to leave soon, but for now they're still doing well above Black Duck, whilst it's also of interest that the ducks are starting to moult into their post-breeding eclipse plumage, possibly a little earlier than expected.
The final new addition this month went to a Common Tern bombing up the river. Terns haven't been as obvious this year as previous, you can often find them at nearby Cliffe Pools but they've been thin on the ground so far so this was a nice bird to see, albeit briefly.
I'm expecting more of the same in July, and it will be interesting to see if some of the birds I missed this month turn up next. Obviously anything I see/miss has the caveat of the blind luck of what's about on the day but after a couple of months of not seeing a certain species some conclusions may be drawn!
Collared Dove
Woodpigeon
Feral Dove
Jackdaw
Jay
Magpie
Carrion Crow
Raven
House Sparrow
Reed Bunting
Goldfinch
Chaffinch
Goldfinch
Dunnock
Pied Wagtail
Bearded Tit
Blue Tit
Long Tailed Tit
Great Tit
Starling
Meadow Pipit
Robin
Blackbird
Song Thrush
Chiffchaff
Whitethroat
Lesser Whitethroat
Reed Warbler
Sedge Warbler
Cettis Warbler
Chiffchaff
Grasshopper Warbler
Cuckoo
Swift
Swallow
House Martin
Sand Martin
Pheasant
Black Headed Gull
Herring Gull
Lesser Black Backed Gull
Med Gull
Common Tern
Cormorant
Oystercatcher
Lapwing
Mallard
Shoveller
Pochard
Tufted Duck
Shelduck
Greylag Goose
Mute Swan
Little Grebe
Coot
Moorhen
Water Rail
Grey Heron
Buzzard
Marsh Harrier
Sparrowhawk
Kestrel
Peregrine
Red Kite (flyover)
Total 61
Running Total 102
