They're here....

Autumn has finally arrived and has started of quite nicely with 2 Barred Warblers in the garden along with a Garden Warbler and 5 Willow Warblers. Just 1 Willow Warbler on the rest of the patch, but it was pissing down all day, so I'm sure there's more to be found out there when the weather clears.

Barred Warblers

Barred

On the patch today - 2 Willow Warblers, 1 Whinchat, 1 Shoveler, 1 Bar-tailed Godwit, 3 Grey Heron, 1 Golden Plover, 2 Pink-footed Geese, 1 Lapland Bunting, 1 Little Stint and a Barred Warbler.

Barred Warbler

Bar-tailed Godwit with Curlews

Grey Heron

Little Stint

 

Barred

Just as I'm about to go back to work for another 14 nights, the Barred Warbler that has been in the garden for the last few days, finally decided to put on a show - just a pity it was in the fog and only viewable from the kitchen window. I've just noticed that this is my 999th post on this blog ! - I'll maybe do something a bit special for my next post.

Even More Shrikes

More rain overnight and more migrants on my new temporary patch - 23 Hoopoes, 1 Great Reed Warbler, 4 Ortolan Bunting, 2 Spotted Flycatcher, 25 Reed Warbler (none yesterday), 40 Barred Warbler, now 96 Red-backed Shrikes, 10 Willow Warbler, 2 Chiffchaffs, 1 Red-throated Pipit, 3 Citrine Wagtails, 15 Yellow Wagtails, 3 Lesser Grey Shrikes, 40 Isabelline Wheatear, 6 Lesser Whitethroat and 10 Common Whitethroat.
A Great Crested Grebe offshore was a bit of a surprise. Also 27 Black-winged Stilt flew over heading south mid morning.

Barred Warbler

Citrine Wagtail

Isabelline Wheatear

Lesser Grey Shrike

Red-backed Shrike

Reed Warbler

Batumi, the day it rained Shrikes

Day one in Batumi, waited in all day for the rain to stop, by early afternoon it still hadn't stopped but I went out anyway. Headed for the site of the old casino, an area of rough ground about the size of a footie pitch - Jeezie Creezie - migrants everywhere !!!
Totals for about 2 hours - 15 Barred Warblers, 40 Whinchat, 60+ Isabelline Wheatear, 100+ Willow Warblers, 2 Lesser Whitethroat, 40 Yellow Wagtail, 15 Tawny Pipits, 3 Citrine Wagtail, 8 Ortolan Bunting, 40 Swallow, 1 Hoopoe and, best of all, 72 Red-backed Shrikes !

Barred Warbler

Isabelline Wheatear

Red-backed Shrike

Whinchat

Yellow Wagtail

Barred

The only bird of note today was a stunning Barred Warbler in the garden this morning.

Tame

The Barred Warbler that has been in the garden all week is now so stupidly tame it's took to feeding on Craneflies around the windows. Took this video this morning - ignore the commentary in the background, that's just the Discovery Channel with a documentary claiming that the Welsh 'found' North America - is there anything that the Welsh don't claim to have found ?!!!

Multiple Entries

Barred Warbler
A Barred Warbler in the garden was showing stupidly well this morning, it turned up yesterday and gave reasonable views, but today it was proper posing.

As it was in the rain yesterday




and today, posing away

Stalking the Owl

Out on the patch and I picked up a Short-eared Owl on a pile of rocks in the middle of a field, a bit too far away to get a descent shot, so I tried to stalk it across an open area along a fence, and amazingly it just dropped off the rocks onto the ground and fell asleep !



Distant, then sleeping, and then it heard the shutter going off

Elsewhere on the patch - 2 Swallows and 15 Pink-footed Geese (2 over the house and 13 over the loch.

You're Barred

With the wind still south-easterly (ish) and a fine bright day, there really ought to be new birds in around the patch - and there was ! 2 Barred Warblers in the garden, 5 Tree Pipits around the Old Scatness dig, 3 Ruff in with the Oystercatchers, a Whinchat and a Redstart around the big house (not a prison, just a house that's big !), plus 2 Yellow Wagtails, 4 Willow Warbler, 2 Garden Warbler, a Knot and 2 Grey Herons.

Barred Warblers

Struggle.

A bit of a struggle on the patch - 17 Lapland Buntings and a Song Thrush ! A bit better in the garden with the fourth Barred Warbler of the autumn and a Yellow-browed Warbler.

Barred Warbler.

Lapland Bunting.

No Apologies.

A bit of a clear out around the patch, but the few things that I did come across showed very well, so no apologies for the amount of photos. A new technique for getting good views of warblers in the garden seems to be - empty the moth trap of moths and loads of crane flies into the roses in front of the living room window, half hour later, Barred Warbler shows very well ! (the third one in the garden this autumn).The Lapland Buntings were showing very today too and were up to 26 birds, before 20 of them flew off high towards Compass Head with a load of Skylarks. The surprise of the day goes to an Otter, which came bounding towards me on the cliff tops whilst I was going through the Larks and Pipits (not sure who was most surprised, me or the otter), eventually it noticed me and headed off down a Geo and promptly went to sleep ! A bit of new migration going on with 9 Swallows heading south, and Black-tailed Godwit and Ruff around the Loch.

Lapland Buntings.

Barred Warbler.

Otter.

Blank.

The first blank night for the moth trap since 14th May ! not too surprising given the force 7-8 north westerly blowing all night !
Bird wise, the Barred Warbler is still in the garden along with a male Blackcap and a couple of Wheatears, 2 Sanderling on Moast Beach and a Whitethroat in the thistle patch.

Barred Warbler.

Wheatear.