2nd November

Today's leaden, mizzle-filled and increasingly windswept sky delivered a constant procession of flocks of Redwings arriving in off the sea and heading away north that kept the day's few fieldworkers on their toes until well into the afternoon. At the Bill, 360 were logged but the sight from there of a single huge flock of 500 over Southwell suggested that far higher numbers might have been on offer up the island had anyone been looking; many of the flocks contained a few Fieldfares - including 60 at the Bill - whilst Song Thrushes and Blackbirds were represented albeit seemingly in considerably lower numbers. Other arrivals at the Bill included 60 Chaffinches, 20 Siskins, 6 Reed Buntings, a trickle of Blackcaps, Chiffchaffs and Goldcrests, 3 Lapwings, 2 Swallows and singles of Grey Heron, Brambling and Bullfinch, whilst elsewhere 2 Avocets dropped in at Ferrybridge; the Hawfinch was again about first thing in the morning and at least singles of Black Redstart and Firecrest lingered. The sea was also busy, mainly with auks that totalled 4370 through off the Bill during the morning and many hundreds more later; 26 Brent Geese, 5 Balearic Shearwaters, 5 Shelducks, 3 Mallard, 2 Wigeon and singles of Red-throated Diver, Great Northern Diver, Teal, Pochard, Grey Plover and Curlew also passed by offshore.

Harking back to what we wrote about yesterday, today we trapped another obviously 'non-local' Chiffchaff that we had absolutely no joy with in capturing the subtleties of it's colour on a photograph. It was clearly something northern or eastern but had to our eyes far too much of a green component in its plumage (that's almost completely lost in this photograph!) for it to be a conventional Siberian Chiffchaff; its legs and bill were both also considerably paler than yesterday's bird. More on this one if the feather sample gives us some answers © Martin Cade:

Redwings were today's feature birds both overhead and turning up in the mist-nets © Martin Cade:

And back to yesterday for a couple of things we forgot for the blog post. It hasn't been a very good autumn for dispersing Dartford Warbler so the second one of the season from the Crown Estate Field nets was nice to have a close look at © Martin Cade:

There was also a nice close pass over the sound recorder on the Obs patio by a Woodlark which was pleasing because this is a species that, despite it being tolerably regular overhead during autumn passage, we nearly always seem to fail to record for one reason or another

A Sowerby's Beaked Whale on the shore of Portland Harbour at Wyke this morning. First record for Dorset?

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— Bob Ford (@bobthebirder.bsky.social) November 2, 2024 at 5:26 PM

Reduction in migrant moth numbers overnight at the Obs but still pretty decent considering how much cooler and breezier in was; a Golden Twin-spot the best

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— Portland Bird Observatory (@portlandbirdobs.bsky.social) November 2, 2024 at 1:04 PM