25th September

Splendid isolation focuses your mind in peculiar ways, even to the realisation earlier this year that there's a strong correlation between good drying weather and there being no birds about - today, with its three loads of washing done and nothing better than a fly-by Lapland Bunting logged (...and that wasn't even seen!) did nothing more than confirm this hitherto overlooked nugget of wisdom. In an at times raging northerly and under completely clear skies it really wasn't a surprise that most of what was logged was passing overhead: the Lapland Bunting aside, the totals from the Bill included 350 Meadow Pipits, 190 alba wagtails, 58 Siskins, 11 Redpolls, 10 Chaffinches and 2 Golden Plovers. Persistence on the ground did eventually reveal a thin spread of the usual suspects, along with a few lingering waders at Ferrybridge that included 2 Little Stints. A single Balearic Shearwater passed through off the Bill.

There was a lovely warm glow to the dawn light: Bar-tailed Godwit, Little Stint and Sandwich Tern at Ferrybridge © Pete Saunders:




And a couple more of from last week: Purple Sandpiper and Sparrowhawk at the Bill © Anthony Cheke: