3rd August

Yesterday's real murkiness might have been blown away by the fresh southwesterly but it remained predominantly overcast and on odd occasions even slightly damp - no, whatever fell definitely qualify as what we have a vague memory used to called rain. Unfortunately, these slightly propitious conditions didn't do a lot on the migrant front, with a scatter of 20 Willow Warblers the best on offer at the Bill and wader totals largely unchanged at Ferrybridge. The sea was a tad more interesting with 4 Balearic Shearwaters and 2 Yellow-legged Gulls lingering and 10 Common Scoter and a Manx Shearwater through offshore.

Despite the temperature remained well up overnight the moth catch was again very disappointing, with a stray Gorse Knot-horn Pempelia genistella (it's been a good summer for them with the combined total for all the island trap sites now into double figures) the best of the poor selection at the Obs.

Returning to last week, we'd been told that there were some question marks over the identification of this crimson underwing trapped at the Obs on the night of 29th/30th July, with the amount of white peppering on the forewing a particular concern...


...fortunately it had been retained for further inspection and on our return it only took a quick bit of manipulation to expose the hindwing and reveal a nice W of black that confirmed it as a Dark Crimson Underwing - the seventh record for the island of a moth whose range seems to be expanding at quite a rate © Martin Cade:


Portland Bill: back on home patch. Several thousand gulls in flat light offshore this evening. A large adult/-type) Yellow-legged Gull, and my first ever 2cy / 2nd summer photographed in August. 😄@PortlandBirdObs pic.twitter.com/D6GAxv1jwk