Location
Sunrise: 06:24 BST
12°C > 14°C: Mainly clear start; clouded by 08:00 and rain started by 08:20. Light S wind. Very good visibility reduced somewhat at onset of rain
(91st visit of the year)
No more work on the trees. The felled trunks have been reduced to chippings and used to dress some of the areas used as fishing platforms. So no chance of natural rotting of the wood and the nutrients returning to the soil
Notes
- all three adult Great Crested Grebes seen; still only 1 adult with the juvenile
- no idea why so few adult Coots seen
and
- I found my first-ever moth in the tunnel under Telford Way (the A5): was not resting at the best of angles but I think a Garden Dart
Birds noted flying over
- 1 Feral Pigeon
- 5 Wood Pigeon
- 4 Starlings
- 1 Pied Wagtail
Hirundines etc. seen here today
- 6 House Martins
Warblers seen / heard around the water: numbers in brackets are singing birds: song very sporadic now
- 2 (0) Chiffchaffs again
The counts from the water
- 2 + 1 Mute Swans
- 8 Greylag Geese
- 2 Canada Geese again
- 1 all white feral goose
- 30 (23♂) Mallard
- 16 (5?♂) Tufted Ducks
- 1 Grey Heron yet again
- 3 + 1 Great Crested Grebes
- 2 + 4 (3 broods) Moorhens
- 9 + 4 (3 broods) Coots
- 6 Black-headed Gulls (2 juveniles)
(Ed Wilson)
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Priorslee Lake: 07:25 – 08:55
Location
(126th visit of the year)
A somewhat abbreviated visit. The clear sky when I left home and the forecast of rain by 11:00 left me unprepared for the rain at 08:20 and I decided that discretion was the better part of valour
Notes from today
- the 2 Canada Geese left alone by the Swans; no sign of the bird with the broken wing seen on Wednesday
- no sign of the Little Grebes this morning
- 2 Kingfishers seen together and several more single sightings: suspect some were juveniles from the local breeding birds
- a lone Barn Swallow flew NE
- no Reed Warblers noted – possibly more to do with the wet conditions than anything else
and
- 3 moths on the lamps: all Pearl Veneer (Agriphila straminella) moths
- no butterflies or dragonflies
- a dead shrew sp. seen: I think a Pygmy Shrew. Shortly afterwards one of the local Buzzards flew off with a (different) prey item in its talons
Counts of birds flying over the lake (in addition to those on / around lake)
- 4 Lesser Black-backed Gulls
- 3 Feral Pigeons (1 group)
- 1 Stock Dove
- 14 Wood Pigeons
- 2 Rooks
- 2 Pied Wagtails
- 4 Greenfinches
- 3 Goldfinches
Hirundines etc. seen here today
- 1 Barn Swallow only
- 15 House Martins
Warblers seen / heard around the water: numbers in brackets are singing birds: song very sporadic now
- 9 (0) Chiffchaffs
- 4 (0) Blackcaps
The counts from the lake area
- 2 + 1 Mute Swans
- 2 Canada Geese
- 9 (5♂) Mallard
- 11 (2♂) Tufted Ducks
- 7 + 6 (3 broods) Great Crested Grebes
- 1 + 2 (2 broods) Moorhens
- 47 + 10 juvenile Coots
- 127 Black-headed Gulls
- 38 Lesser Black-backed Gulls
- 3 Herring Gulls
A portrait of one of the juvenile Great Crested Grebes
This is the underside.
(Ed Wilson)
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On this day in ...........
2015Priorslee Lake
Today's Sightings Here
2014
Priorslee Lake
Today's Sightings Here
2013
Nedge Hill
2 Yellow Wagtails
(John Isherwood)
2011
Priorslee Lake
Kingfisher
(Ed Wilson)
2009
Priorslee Lake
Kingfisher
(Ed Wilson)
2006
Priorslee Lake
Kingfisher
(Ed Wilson)