Busy...

Busy, busy...no time for blogging...some photos from the last few weeks...but not getting out much lately...Hawfinch invasion passing me by...can't win an argument at home because every time I get close they play the 'Shetland' joker...etc etc.

The Red Admiral is having a great year - I saw one at Wareham station this morning but this one on Ivy was taken last weekend at Middlebere

Kingfisher at Lodmoor

An obliging individual

Always brightens a dull day

A long-staying Lesser Yellowlegs at Lodmoor 

The second I have seen this year in Dorset....

...after another long staying bird at Lytchett last winter

Avocet are returning to Middlebere in numbers

A Middlebere Merlin put the waders to flight

A dashing male

Rare to get such a good view

Yellow-legged Gull also at Middlebere

Like the Merlin it was intimidating the waders

Raptor round your finger

I've been up and down to Portland this week like the number 1 bus, chasing shadows mainly - specifically the shadows of a male Red-flanked Bluetail and a female Pine Bunting. Both of these major rarities were trapped at the Bill in recent days - see here for stunning photos of them wrapped around the fingers of Martin Cade - and while the chances of either sticking around seemed slim, with a few days off work this week it would have been rude not to head down in the hope of seeing them. In the end I saw neither but there were some photogenic fowl to be enjoyed nonetheless. Raptors put on a particularly fine display with six species seen. Photographic highlights below.

 

This female Hen Harrier has been around Portland Bill for over a week

I bumped into it on several occasions on recent visits

It was often mobbed by corvids - though gave as good as it got on this occasion

Against the sea off the Bill

Banking in response to another corvid attack

Rare to see this species so well...

...though difficult to photograph without the clutter of fence lines...

...gates...

...or vegetation in shot

Well that's almost artistic

Hen Harrier

This Buzzard was also attracting attention from corvids - here with a Raven 

Male Kestrel hanging in the breeze off the West Cliffs this morning

Kestrel

This Peregrine cast a bulky shadow

The classic flying anchor shape

This juvenile Peregrine has a colour-ring - will be interesting to see where that comes from

Finally form Portland a very distant record shot of a Merlin

 

Sparrowhawk was also on Portland though this one was photographed at Durlston earlier in the week

And to close the raptor theme, this Marsh Harrier was at Swineham before my visit was so rudely interrupted by news of a Pine Bunting on Portland!

Things are looking up

It's been a pretty grim week what with the weather, the end of the Christmas holidays, pet-related trauma and the dark mornings etc. So it was nice to have some good news this weekend: not just it being the weekend, but the acquisition of two new guinea pigs, Coulson and Fury, to replace the one which went to the great hutch in the sky earlier in the week. Not that he can ever be replaced, of course.

The new pets are named after characters in the TV series currently enjoying most favoured status in the Moore household: Marvel Agents of SHIELD. Fury, played by Samuel L Jackson in the TV series, is Director of SHIELD and mediates between the US Government and the random selection of superheroes who feature in the series. Coulson is his right hand man, an ice-cool spook whose 'powers', according to the Marvel encyclopedia which one of my sons had for Christmas, include 'excellent administrative abilities'. I have been trying to find a way to make my kids think that my job at the council could be cool, and this is as close as I've come.

Anyway, it was not just those things that were looking up this weekend: several thousand waders at Middlebere were too, keeping a watchful eye on the skies for hunting raptors. While Coulson and Fury were being procured from Yeovil yesterday, and groomed this morning, I was free to spend a couple of hours each day at Middlebere looking for them. There were plenty around in yesterday's low light - best of all Hen Harrier, but also Marsh Harrier and Merlin. In addition there was a Spoonbill, 500+ Avocet, a similar number of Black-tailed Godwit, 300+ Lapwing, and too many Dunlin to count. Not so many raptors this morning in perfect sunshine unfortunately but Merlin and Marsh Harrier put in another appearance.

Hen Harrier, Middlebere - a female seen here regularly this winter was ringed at Langholm Moor in Scotland.

Hen Harrier, Middlebere - species #34 on my photo year list

Hen Harrier

Hen Harrier

Marsh Harrier - a male (#35)

Marsh Harrier - female

A Merlin scattered the waders and pursued a Dunlin flock briefly but unsuccessfully (#36)

A female Bullfinch fed in front of the hide

Common Teal were present in good numbers (#37)

Great Black-backed Gull (#38)

Yellow-legged Gull is reliable at Middlebere

Two were present and their short flights would often disturb the roosting waders

Wheeling flocks of Dunlin were disturbed by passing raptors (#39)

Several hundred Avocet were present over high tide (#40)

Over 300 Lapwing were in the creek (#41)

Just time after the boy's football today (a 5-1 away win at Puddletown, Moore Jnr scoring with a header from a Joe Mitchell corner) to twitch a Bewick's Swan near Tincleton -it was nearly dark by the time we found it (#42)

Fury and Coulson: the Avengers Assemble