The Standlake Birder -

       A Lesser Kestrel was found in Cornwall at a place called Croft Pascoe Woods late afternoon last Friday.  This is another bird that I have a little history with having dipped one in Yorkshire a few years back. It’s the best part of a four hour drive from home so twitching it on Friday was simply not practical. We again had family with us over the weekend so I had to beg forgiveness from my long suffering wife for a Saturday twitch.   Now this was going to be a long drive with considerable jeopardy attached. Unlike, say, a rare leaf warbler, where if your prepared to stare at a hedge for hours on end until you start to hallucinate, there’s a good chance you will see it,  falcons are  by definition very mobile and so can very easily move on. Some comfort could be taken from the fact that it had been observed going to roost into pines late on Friday night at the reported location.    Given the above, I decided to not ri...

            Red-spotted Blue Throat T here has been a Bluethroat at a place called Swineham on the Dorset coast for over a month. It has become increasingly confiding as, rightly or wrongly, people have been putting out food for it. This is a scarce vagrant from mainland Europe that I get to see somewhere in the UK most years. Many of my     birding friends have visited and had fantastic views and Facebook has had many superb photos posted of this most attractive male specimen.    I’ve done quite well in avoiding the temptation, it is after a three hour drive from home, and have stuck with local birding for the past month. I supposed that it was always going to happen if the bird stayed long enough and on Monday this week, with another glorious sunny warm spring day in the offing, I finally gave into temptation and left home southbound at 6am.    The early Monday morning traffic was pretty bad leaving me to rue not getting up a...

  Tree Pipit Monday at dawn found me back at my happy place, the beautiful Wyre Forest. And what a wonderful  dawn it was, sunny, bitter cold with a clear sky overhead, a light mist in the valleys and a touch of frost on the ground. It felt for all the world as though I had been spirted to the enchanted elven wood  of Lothlórien rather than the English midlands. I love getting to the forest at dawn and being the first car in the car park. The solitude of the first two hours of so in the wood before dog walkers and bikers arrive on mass always has such a positive and uplifting effect on me mentally.   My main targets today were the returning Tree Pipits which I had only glimpsed and heard snatches of the previous week. Walking down the forest hill from Hawkbatch I was struck by how noticeably quieter it was compared to the previous week, I guess the cold frosty start to the day had somewhat dampened the spirts of the  dawn chorus.  Down a...

  Pied Flycatcher With a lovely sunny day forecast for this Wednesday I decided to have a long day out searching for migrants. I visited 4 sites, Wyre Forest, Clee Common, Grimley and Cleeve Hill in that order. First stop then was Wyre Forest at dawn. I’ve set myself a little project this spring to visit the Wyre Forest at least once a week during spring to monitor and enjoy the progression of migrants coming in. First in a month or so ago was a big influx of  Chiffchaffs going from none to them singing from almost every bush within a week. There was then a bit of a lull until the first Willow Warblers came in around two weeks ago.   Today I parked in the Hawkbatch car park and walked slowly through the forest and down the hill towards the brook. It was immediately obvious that the Willow Warblers had arrived on mass since my previous visit a week ago with their characteristic song serenading me as I walked through the forest.   My big target today was Pied Flyc...