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21st August

A really nice day with the light northerly breeze allowing for good coverage and mist-netting of a decent arrival of grounded and overflying migrants. Willow Warblers were still strongly to the fore on the ground, with 120 at the Bill where in truth there wasn't really a great deal of other variety beyond the very routine expecteds in much lower numbers; signs of some new Dunnocks dropping in was a little unexpected this early in the season. It was more rewarding overhead, where the first good showing of the season of the customary late August trio of Yellow Wagtail, Tree Pipit and Grey Wagtail chipped in with totals of 80, 25 and 3 respectively. Waders were well-represented, with 9 Redshank, 4 Sanderling, 3 Knot, 2 Black-tailed Godwits and the first Bar-tailed Godwit of the autumn at Ferrybridge. Given the wind direction, the sea was the day's surprise package, with 165 Manx Shearwaters, 160 Kittiwakes, 100 Lesser Black-backed Gulls, 42 Balearic Shearwaters, 3 Arctic Skuas, 2 Teal and a Little Egret amongst others through off the Bill.

Some random migrants that popped up in front of us or in our mist-nets during the course of what turned out to be the most enjoyably varied day of the autumn so far - Tree Pipit, Yellow Wagtail, and Black-tailed and Bar-tailed Godwits © Martin Cade



The daylight hours were varied enough but the Obs nocmig recorder revealed that the nighttime hours had been just as interesting, with a whole lot of Tree Pipits along with waders that included (multiples in most cases) Oystercatcher, Ringed Plover, Little Ringed Plover, Dunlin, Curlew, Green Sandpiper and Common Sandpiper; however, very much the highlight came in the form of a Night Heron that circled about overhead after midnight - as far as we can make out there are a total of 69 calls between 00:34 and 00:44; here's a sequence of a few of them at the beginning of this period: