Shalford patch diary, weeks eight and nine

Tuesday 23rd February

Buoyed by a great morning at Leith Hill, I headed out again for an afternoon session on the patch. Right from the start there were lots of gulls moving overhead, with the usual several hundred Black-heads rivalled only in number by Common Gull, of which at least 150 flew north during my visit. Clearly at least some of these birds are the ones that spend the day down in the fields around Thorncombe Park and Wintershall, but where are they all going to roost? There were also at least 25 Herring Gulls heading the same way, plus a single Lesser Black-backed which flew east. There have been quite a few Med Gulls around the county recently and I'm hoping one will turn up in one of these flocks one of these days, or perhaps something even rarer, particularly with spring now just around the corner.

St Catherine's Pool was rather empty, with just a couple of Teal of note, while there were five on the railway pool. Raptors were represented by Sparrowhawk, Peregrine, a pair of displaying Kestrels and two single Red Kites which both flew north-west. There was a lone female Stonechat in the meadow beside St Catherine's Lock.

Stonechat (female) - Richard Waters

Teal on Railway Pool

Thursday 25th February

Another gloriously sunny late winter (is it too early to say early spring?) day and another afternoon visit to the patch. St Catherine's Pool was a little more lively today with at least six Teal and a Little Grebe present. The usual pair of Kestrels were again displaying near St Catherine's Lock, with a third bird also frequenting the area, while a single Buzzard soared overhead. Not quite as much in the way of gull movement tonight - 'only' 50 Common Gulls north amongst the usual Black-heads. Also a single Cormorant north-west.

Common Alder catkins

Friday 26th February

An early morning visit before a day's local birding with Ed Stubbs and, after Saturday's first singing Reed Bunting of the season, this morning there was something of a schoeniclus symphony going on out in the meadows! There were at least seven singing males in the area, most of them congregated quite close together in Broom Meadow near St Catherine's Lock. 

Reed Bunting

Teal were also present in better numbers than of late, with eight on St Catherine's Pool and at least eighteen on the railway pool. Up in the sky both Kestrels and Sparrowhawks were displaying,

Richard Waters paid the meadows an evening visit and got some nice shots of Mandarin and Kingfisher, the latter of which I have still yet to see on this new patch - not that I'm jealous!

Mandarin - Richard Waters 

Kingfisher - Richard Waters

Monday 29th February

It was good to meet up with Rob Craig, the NT lengthsman for this area, after work who showed me some of the rather more hidden corners of the Shalford/Broadford area and gave me a potted history of the area and his bird sightings from over the years as we walked around. The bird highlights of our stroll were a pair of Shoveler, a drake Teal, and a Woodcock which flew up from near the railway line. 

Wednesday 2nd March 

The first patch visit of meteorological spring, although you wouldn't think it going by the weather. After a day of sleet and hail showers there was still a stiff north-westerly blowing when I got to the meadows and it proved to be the first time I have actually felt properly cold out there this year. Suffice to say I didn't stand still for long! Black-headed Gulls were streaming north as usual, many now wearing their summer heads, although it was interesting to note the odd group moving south - some signs of seasonal movement rather than birds heading to roost sites perhaps? Common Gulls were still firmly heading north though; at least 65 in the 90 minutes I was present. Another sign of spring was provided by the local pair of Kestrels mating, while a third bird again remained in the area. On St Catherine's Pool there were three Teal, two pairs of Shoveler, two Grey Herons and a Little Grebe, while further downstream Robin Stride reported a Little Egret just south of Guildford Rowing Club. 

Common Gulls gathering above Shalford

Sunday 6th March

Another bracing morning out in the water meadows, but little sign of it affecting the spring feelings amongst the local birdlife, with at least two Reed Buntings singing, four Great Spotted Woodpeckers drumming and two male Kestrels displaying. Other highlights included a Little Egret which briefly dropped in on the Artington side of the railway line before flying off north over St Catherine's Hill. Five Buzzards were up and soaring by mid-morning plus a Red Kite which drifted in from the south-east. There were still at least two Stonechats in the vicinity of St Catherine's Lock, plus a third male just south of Broadford Bridge. Wildfowl were represented by Teal (fifteen on Railway Pool, four on St Catherine's Pool and a pair on Broadford Marsh), Shoveler (two pairs on St Catherine's Pool) and a pair of Mandarin on St Catherine's Pool. I had one Little Grebe on the river by St Catherine's Pool while Richard Waters later noted two on the navigation by the lock. Gull numbers were fairly low with just a few sum-plum Black-headeds north, one adult Lesser Black-backed north and a first winter Herring Gull west. 

It's now been over two weeks since I had a patch tick, with my year list well and truly stalled on 76 species (81 points for Patchwork Challenge) - bring on the spring migrants!

Here's a few more pictures from the past couple of weeks.

Stonechat (male) - Richard Waters

Kestrel (female) - Richard Waters 

Redwing

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Leith Hill - first tower watch of 2016 and goodbye Sam Bayley

It's been two years now since National Trust ranger Sam Bayley first mooted the idea of a visible migration watch at his work place of Leith Hill near Dorking - the highest point in south-east England. Indeed, standing atop the tower you are looking down on The Shard and, if you were to go east, the next highest point is in the Ural Mountains, as Sam always used to love to tell visitors up the tower. So on 5th April 2014 the first group of birders gathered (in a sea of fog, mind!) and since then almost 400 hours of 'vis-migging' have been carried out up the tower, producing well over a hundred species - quite a remarkable feat when you consider the observers remain largely static on the roof which is just a few metres square.

Leith Hill Tower panorama - photo by David Campbell

After a rather late start to the first migration watching season in 2014, in 2015 we opted to begin on 1st March and this year we decided on an even earlier date - 23rd February - mainly because Sam is upping sticks and moving to Ireland. It's no exaggeration to say that Sam has totally put Leith Hill on the map with his ringing and birding efforts up there, not to mention of course the tower watches. He will be missed but we will do our best to carry on his legacy!

Sam Bayley with Buzzard

So it was that four of us - David Stubbs, Robin Stride, Sam and I - convened at first light on Tuesday and made our way up to the tower, where we were soon joined by Wes Attridge and David Campbell, who'd unfortunately got held up en route. 

It was a frosty morning and there was a chilly breeze blowing in from the North Downs, and it's fair to say that none of us were exactly expecting fireworks on the migration side of things. 

Looking south-east from Leith Hill towards Gatwick

We'd soon added plenty of common species to the day list - including at least two hooting male Tawny Owls - before we spotted a Woodlark displaying over Duke's Warren to the north-east; the hill's largest area of open heathland. Throughout the course of the morning we recorded at least four displaying birds, their 'too-lueet' calls occasionally reaching us on the breeze. It was quite something to watch them hanging in the air in front of the London skyline, as Robin so perfectly described later on Twitter. 

Apart from being a great sight in their own right, the Woodlarks proved useful in helping us find other birds, as it was while watching them that Wes picked up three Golden Plover heading north-west distantly over the downs. Unfortunately not everyone got on the birds but as it was a new species for Leith Hill it meant it was time for David S to break out the now traditional orange Club biscuits in celebration!

Other species on the move included quite a few Rooks - not a particularly common sight up the hill - and lots of Herring Gulls, the odd Lesser Black-backed and Black-headed amongst them. Other than 210 Starlings east in two flocks, passerines were fairly thin on the ground with just a few Siskins, Chaffinches, Greenfinches and Goldfinches past, plus two Fieldfare east, one Brambling west and two Meadows Pipits and a Grey Wagtail south. 

David Stubbs unfortunately had to leave us mid-morning which we joked would mean all the best birds would appear. The sun was out by now and the air was perceptibly warming, and by 10:30 there were good numbers of raptors in the sky including at least a dozen Buzzards. Just after 10:40 Wes and David S picked up a Sparrowhawk to the north-east. David Campbell thought he'd got on the same bird but quickly realised this bird was no Sparrowhawk. Soon we'd all got on it, and over the course of the next half hour were treated to phenomenal views of the young female Goshawk as it thermalled around the tower at close range, before drifting powerfully south/south-east at 11:12. David Campbell managed to capture some excellent phone-scope footage of it.

In all we recorded 55 species in almost six hours. Not a bad start to the 2016 Leith Hill vis-mig season and a very fitting send-off for Mr Bayley. Roll on the next tower watch!

Results of tower watch on Trektellen