June 26th 2010

I was bored with local birding so went to Norfolk mid afternoon yesterday for a bag of seaside Fish & Chips. A brief look at the Titchwell RSPB reserve produced Little Egret, Bearded Tit, Marsh Harrier, Avocet and Spotted Redshank then found a good location to set up the moth trap up in before moving on to one of the coastal heaths to look for Nightjars via the chip shop. They always seem to taste better with sea air even if the fish had been frozen longer than it lived. As we waited for dusk a Barn Owl and young Tree Pipits were seen before 2 Nightjars started flying over the heath then it was back to the trap which did better than I expected with nine species that were new for me before packing up for the journey home. I did not have much chance to rest as both mine and Dave’s traps were heaving with over 600 moths of 90 species between us. I grabbed a couple of hours sleep before Bob came round with the magic lens.
Back out again this afternoon with pheromones searching for clearwings eventually finding 27 Currant and 3 Red-belted from 2 orchards and 3 allotments searched and a look at the pond produced a Little Egret flying over towards biggen bay so a decent bird at last but far too tired to go chasing after it to see if it landed. Also seen or heard were Sedge Warbler, Whitethroat, Garden Warbler, Blackcap, 4 Lesser Black-backed Gulls, Whitethroat, 2 Green Woodpecker and 2 Hobby trawling the sky’s for insects. This evening 150+ gulls flew over the estate as I set up a number of traps in the allotment behind Dave’s house.

Richard