EVENSONG

A male blackbird has taken up a song perch outside my front door and he is regularly serenading in the evening sunshine.

"I WILL ALWAYS LOVE YEW?"

A pair of goldfinches are also regular visitors to the niger seeds.

A Painted Lady was seen at Samphire Hoe on Sunday morning,a very early arrival,hopefully it will be a good year for this long distance migrant,another early migrant turned up in the moth trap.

PAINTED LADY

SILVER Y.

An afternoon trip to Stodmarsh on monday turned up a few hobbies on the wing a calling cuckoo,numerous reed and sedge warblers,nightingale,garden warbler,booming bittern,an influx of swifts and sand martins,several displaying marsh harriers and greylag geese already with youngsters on the water.

GARDEN WARBLER

MOTHER GOOSE

HOBBY in smart red trousers.

HOBBY Enjoying in flight meal.
There was also an encouraging number of butterflies on the wing especially peacock and small tortoishell,with a single red admiral in very good condition.

RED ADMIRAL

Tuesday was notable only for a monumental miss by yours truly at the Hoe when a MONTAGUS HARRIER snuck into the country behind my back,but couldn`t escape the eagle eyed Ian Roberts.
The evening was much better when a trip to Eastleigh near Southampton gave Dover a terrific 3-1 win in the first leg of play off semi final,come on you whites,second leg at home saturday,got to bed 1am.

Yesterday a trip to the marsh gave me a few more firsts for the year in lesser whitethroat,yellow wagtail and common sandpiper at Botolphs Bridge and common tern and garganey at Dunge.A bright sunny day but the nagging easterly breeze took the edge off things.

MALE CHAFFINCH in full throated song.

Called in to Ham Street woods on the way home and recorded Brimstone,Speckled Wood,Orangetip and good numbers of Peacocks once more.

BRIMSTONE

ORANGETIP

SPECKLED WOOD

Thats it for now dear reader,I`ll be back soon.

DONANA,DONANA, DONANA IS GOOD ENOUGH FOR ME.

Last week PEDRO WELLS and I spent a week in the south west of Spain visiting the splendid bird watching area of Donana,we stayed in the small town of Villamanrique,centrally situated for most of the local reserves.The top birds in no particular order were :-white stork,bee eater,woodchat shrike,collared pratincole,booted eagle,short toed eagle,lesser kestrel,glossy ibis,spoonbill,purple heron,serin,red rumped swallow,black kite,great reed warbler,penduline tit,azure winged magpie,night heron,nightingale,and many others.Here are some I managed pictures of.

WHITE STORK

WOODCHAT SHRIKE

LESSER KESTREL

YELLOW WAGTAIL

SHORT TOED EAGLE

CRESTED LARK

HOOPOE

NIGHTINGALE

BOOTED EAGLE

BEE EATER

GLOSSY IBIS

PURPLE HERON

BLACK WINGED STILT

SPOONBILL

KNAPWEED FRITILLARY

WOODCHAT SHRIKES MATING

HE DIDN`T EVEN SAY GOODBYE.

WHITE STORK AT NESTING SITE VILLAMANRIQUE.

IS IT A BIRD?

NIGHT HERONS LEAVING ROOST AT DUSK,the mosquitoes came out too.

WALL BROWN

      "EL ROCCIO"

WONDERFUL LAND

A TYPICAL LANDSCAPE- CORRIDOR VERDE

A SHADY CHARACTER!

AZURE WINGED MAGPIE(taken on a previous trip)

HOW THE PENDULINE TIT WAS NAMED.We watched the male collecting cotton fibres from the barbed wire fence to make this fantastic home.

The nearest we got to a LYNX.

COLLARED PRATINCOLE-these super little birds were quite numerous in the area,this one at Huevla.

The weather was terrific, warm and sunny with hardly a cloud in the sky all week,a real pleasure to be out birding without 6 or7 layers on.

I could go on but I`ll leave it at that for now,if you want to go there and want more ifo,don`t hesitate to contact me.

GOOD NIGHT.

GOLDEN PLOVER

Saturday morning at the Hoe,found a golden plover resting on the sea wall,it took flight out to sea then circled back a couple of hundred yards further on and landed once more.I couldn`t see it on the ground as it was so well camouflaged,but when I almost stumbled over it again it only moved a few metres and allowed me to get some reasonable views.

GOLDEN PLOVER

I left it to rest and went on my way to the eastern end where the black redstarts have returned.

BLACK REDSTART male,think this is the blackest black redstart I have seen at the Hoe.