Dorset Days.

Struck it lucky again with the weather last week with a trip to Dorset.  RSPB Arne on Friday and back there again on the Tuesday.

Possible highlight was watching a fishing osprey, amazing views through the binoculars but in the excitement photos not so good.

A wide variety of birds seen including, distant spoonbills, avocets,

black-tailed godwits, marsh harrier, sandwich terns and closer views of redshank, spotted redshank and large numbers of curlews with their wonderful babbling calls.

On the open heathland stonechat,

whinchat, wheatear and redstart.

We also found sand lizards.

Common lizards basking in the warm sunshine.

The warm weather also brought out large numbers of dragonfly, darters and a few of a very dainty damselfly which as yet I can't ID.

A good place for sika deer too.

Sunday visited Abbotsbury Subtropical Gardens and beside all the amazing plants watched hummingbird hawkmoths.

More lizards here aswell, but this time introduced common wall lizards. 
Monday Portland Bill; found many more wheatear.

A few rock pipits.

White wagtail.

Young kestrel so focused on looking for prey from a holiday hut rooftop  we passed. 
Also called into RSPB reserve Lodmoor and Radipole and at Radipole had good close views of more  black tailed godwits and distant views of great white and little egrets. The next few days stuck to the coast paths where many hundreds of swallows and martins continuously throughout the days were heading east towards Portland. Many more stonechats and whinchats seen most flycatching from the tops of gorse.

Good numbers of clouded yellow butterflies about and red admirals feeding on the blackberries.

Another highlight, found two cattle egrets feeding with cattle at the Swannery at Abbotsbury.

 

It was good to see early every morning large numbers of swallows and house martins on and around the cottage where we were staying, but none seen on the day we left so wonder if they had also set off on their long migration south.

Stewart. 
Images Copyright: Stewart Dennis.

Petition : Stop Link Rd widening, Great Missenden, Bucks.

I just signed the petition "Stop Link Rd widening, Great Missenden, Bucks" and wanted to ask if you could add your name too. I always hated the idea but now that HS2 is under review the rationale really gone. But it’s about to happen. The trees are due to be felled by Bucks County Council contractors in just over two weeks time, so this is extremely urgent.

This campaign means a lot to me and the more support we can get behind it, the better chance we have of succeeding. You can read more and sign the petition here:

https://you.38degrees.org.uk/petitions/stop-link-rd-widening-great-missenden-bucks?share=5f590785-6721-4c99-9677-f1bdfa9ee689&source=email-share-button

22nd September..... Coombe Hill.

This Roe Deer showed nicely in between the patches of Gorse, it's a shame the same couldn't be said of the Restart which showed a brief flash of red tail as it moved between the Hawthorn bushes on the escarpment below the monument, where 24 Swallows passed by as they moved through south. After settling on top of a tree for about ten minutes a Mistle Thrush continued it's journey in the same direction. Two Cormorants appeared from behind Beacon Hill, heading out north over the Vale of Aylesbury. 
Don.

Bathing Blackcap.

Trying something new here with compressed videos, thanks to Tom for sortin' it.
Female bathing in the Dustbin Lid bath, with a male in the foliage behind.

Don.

17th September..... Surrounded by Stonechats.

Finished work early today & needed to make myself scarce, so thought I'd slope off to Ivinghoe Beacon for a couple of hours, with maybe an outside chance of finding yesterday's Wryneck, be a bit like finding a needle in a haystack. Several Meadow Pipits around; in 2 small flocks of 6 & 5 along with single birds c20 in total, same number of Goldfinches, a Buzzard with a very white tail caused a bit of excitement, looking almost like a white rump, 3 Kestrels hunted over the Beacon summit, only saw a single Chiffchaff, 8 Swallows headed east together.
A single Stonechat flew over the path just below the Beacon, settling on a bush briefly, continued on joining a second bird in bushes surrounding an open grassy area, started flycatching, by now I had crept/crawled into the grassy area as a male appeared from behind the bushes, he never settled for long, seemed aware of my presence, where as the others just went about their business, by now I had 5 birds in view.

Don.

14th & 15th September..... Roosting Tawny Owls.

Managed to catch up with my favourite bird again today, after noticing a large amount of splatter below a tall Hazel earlier in the week.

I checked this afternoon & there was Tawny dozing in the Autumn sunshine.                                    
Didn't seem to concerned by my presence, just kept a watchful eye on me as I slowly moved around.

Pigeon Post.

Things got even better today as a second bird was present, with the pair roosting only a few feet apart, one bird showing well out in the open.

With the second bird partially obscured by the foliage.

Don.

Top of the League.

 BetVictor Southern Premier South table

		P	W	D	L	F	A	+/-	Pts
	1	Chesham United	8	6	0	2	18	12	+6	18
	2	Poole Town	7	5	1	1	16	6	+10	16
	3	Truro City	8	5	1	2	12	6	+6	16
	4	Tiverton Town	7	4	2	1	21	12	+9	14
	5	Weston-super-Mare	8	3	4	1	13	10	+3	13
	6	Blackfield & Langley	6	4	0	2	13	8	+5	12
	7	Salisbury	8	3	3	2	17	16	+1	12
	8	Taunton Town	8	3	3	2	13	14	-1	12
	9	Harrow Borough	7	3	2	2	10	10	0	11
	10	Merthyr Town	7	3	1	3	8	8	0	10
	11	Metropolitan Police	8	3	1	4	11	14	-3	10
	12	Wimborne Town	8	2	3	3	12	11	+1	9
	13	Hartley Wintney	7	2	3	2	7	9	-2	9
	14	Farnborough	7	3	0	4	7	11	-4	9
	15	Gosport Borough	7	2	2	3	5	4	+1	8
	16	Hayes & Yeading United	7	2	2	3	12	12	0	8
	17	Swindon Supermarine	7	2	2	3	9	11	-2	8
	18	Hendon	7	1	4	2	10	11	-1	7
	19	Dorchester Town	7	2	1	4	10	15	-5	7
	20	Walton Casuals	7	2	0	5	10	15	-5	6
	21	Yate Town	6	1	1	4	10	14	-4	4
	22	Beaconsfield Town	8	1	0	7	6	21	-15	3