13th July

A miscellaneous selection to report today with early autumn migrants featuring quite well. Ferrybridge provided the best of the numbers that included 238 Mediterranean Gulls, 6 Curlew, 3 Whimbrel, 3 Dunlin, 2 Black-tailed Godwits and a Sanderling, as well as the Little Gull for a second day. At the Bill new arrivals included 4 Redshank, 2 Sedge Warblers and singles of Ringed Plover, Whimbrel, Great Spotted Woodpecker and Reed Warbler, with 50 Manx Shearwaters, 10 Balearic Shearwaters, 5 Common Scoter, a Shoveler and Great Skua through on the sea.

It was a lovely morning to sit and wait for photo opportunities at Ferrybridge and Black-tailed Godwit and Little Gull both obliged © Debby Saunders:



Longleaf (or Sickleweed) Falcaria vulgaris is a naturalised alien first introduced to Britain as a garden plant in the 18th century. The Flora of Dorset notes just three sites in the county of which two are at Portland - whether one of them is near Wallsend where the plant was quite numerous today isn't entirely clear © James Phillips: