Bank Holiday Monday Double

Black Tern (Centre of image, trust me)

Poster boys of Salford Priors

Best I could get in flight

A bit wet underfoot

Whinchat

Scope view - spot the Whinchat

Whinchat 

Paul on the look out

With a shocking forecast and wind direction looking good for Autumn I met up with Paul at 8.45am on Bank Holiday Monday, both accepting we were going to get soaked to the skin. 

On arrival at the main pit I picked up two juvenile Black Terns, a brilliant start to the day. The birds looked to be moving on as they climbed high and headed south however five minutes later they were back feeding on the main pit. These birds must have had endless stamina and only one bird landed (for just two seconds) in the full hour we watched them making any photos practically impossible given the driving rain and wind.

We then headed across the site to the bunds where our short cut proved more of a long cut due to all the growing willows and we ended up walking three times the distance we needed to reach the top of the bunds. 

Swallows and House Martins were soaring past our heads as we battled through the wet grass. Suddenly Paul picked up our target bird, a Whinchat, perched well on some gorse. You beauty, another patch first for us this year. The bird went to ground for ten minutes or so before we re-located it on the south west end of the bunds. This time the Whinchat was good enough for us both to get a record. 

August has been very kind to us and the many hours put in had certainly paid dividends with seven new species for the year, recording 11 species for the patch challenge. Roll on September !