Southern Migrant Hawkers

  Last weekend I moved into my Norwich house ahead of uni restarting in September. Since then me and my housemates have very busy catching up with some of the good birds and insects in the area, and I've built up quite a big backlog of photo editing in doing so (with photos from Scotland still to edit as well)!

One of the first trips I made was to Thompson Common, hoping to catch up with Southern Migrant Hawkers - one of my most hoped for dragonfly sightings. At least six males gave a brilliant performance and certainly lived up to my expectations...

Male Southern Migrant Hawkers

Sooty Tern returns

Had some great views of the adult Sooty Tern in the Kittiwake colonies at Howick and Cullernose Point on Wednesday afternoon. A really smart bird and nice to improve on last year's views...

Black-throated Divers close-up

I had a memorable encounter with a group of post-breeding adult Black-throated Divers on the west coast of Scotland earlier in the week. Having spotted the Divers resting out in the bay, I positioned myself among some rocks and eventually one bird gave extraordinary views as it dived for food less than 20 metres away. There can't be many better looking British birds...

Black-throated Divers

Roseate Terns

Roseate Terns - at least 25 in the roost at Newbiggin on Friday afternoon

Arctic Terns

Grey Heron

Greater Sand Plover

Yesterday evening we headed a short way north of the Scottish border to Tyninghame Bay in Lothian. A first-summer Greater Sand Plover had been found there about a week ago, and had done the decent thing and stuck around until travel restrictions were lifted. 

It was a nice easy twitch, with the Plover quickly picked up on the estuary. It gave some nice scope views as the tide receded, and eventually headed off to its favoured west end once enough of the mud was exposed. My photos aren't great but hopefully show that, despite not being in summer plumage, it was still an attractive bird. Several Whimbrels were at Tyninghame Bay too.

Druridge Pools has also been good recently, with highlights including a group of four Spoonbills, a nice selection of male Ruff and a striking leucistic Black-tailed Godwit.

Greater Sand Plover - please view video in HD at 1080p

Spoonbills

Leucistic Black-tailed Godwit

Red-footed Falcon

On the way back from the Blyth's Reed Warbler last week I stopped near the village of Biggin in North Yorkshire. A first-summer female Red-footed Falcon had been frequenting some fields and wires to the south of the village, and I arrived just in time to see it flushed and fly out of view into the distance.

An our later it wasn't looking promising, but then the falcon was picked up flying towards us and it gave a nice flypast before landing back on its favoured wires. Just the second Red-foot I've seen, it was quite a smart bird and nice to see a female after the moulting male at Druridge in 2015.

The location was quite productive for other raptors and I managed to pick up another four species while looking for the Red-foot; Peregrine, Red Kite, Buzzard and Kestrel. Also nearby, a Little Owl was sat on a roof and a Yellow Wagtail flitted around the fields. 

Red-footed Falcon

Yellow Wagtail

Blyth's Reed Warbler

On Friday I ventured southwards to Far Ings NR in Lincolnshire. My target was the singing male Blyth's Reed Warbler and, sure enough, I was treated to a superb performance by the bird as it sang from its favoured bushes.

Please click on the images below to see higher quality versions...

Please view video in HD at 1080p