Wood Warbler

Dungeness - warm, dry and sunny, NE 2 - We started off at Long Pits this morning where the usual suite of warblers were in song including two Garden Warblers plus a Common Sandpiper fliting over the water. Moving through the Trapping Area, where a Wood Warbler (found by James) could be heard trilling regularly but showing only briefly atop the sallows before moving deeper into cover. A small group of Linnets and a pair of Wheatears were noted around the war memorial but little else on the land. Thirty minutes from the seawatch hide produced 15 Commic and three Little Terns, 10 Whimbrels, two Sandwich Terns and two Mediterranean Gulls. A scan of Kerton Quarry revealed that the fishermen were back, so I moved onto Greatstone beach on a falling tide where 80 Bar-tailed Godwits, 30 Sanderlings and 20 Ringed Plovers were amongst hundreds of Oystercatchers, Curlews and Sandwich Terns. We finished the morning off at Littlestone where a Hoopoe had been reported earlier but had no joy, although a later visit might pay off as the golfers withdraw from the links.

                                  Comma and Orange Tip

Over the weekend a Saturday walk around New Romney farmland produced many more Reed Warblers in the drainage ditches, a flyover Yellow Wagtail and a singing Corn Bunting amongst the usual Common and Lesser Whitethroats, Linnets, Yellowhammers, Skylarks and calling Med Gulls overhead. By early afternoon six Buzzards were counted from the garden thermalling high over the town. On Sunday we did the two bridges walk either side of the canal between Warehorne and Kennardington where the highlights were two Nightingales singing from the railway embankment scrub, a pair of Tree Sparrows by the sluice and a Grey Wagtail feeding juvs under the bridge. Also noted: 10 Linnets, four Goldfinches, two Yellowhammers, 10 Reed and three Sedge Warblers, Common and Lesser Whitethroats, Blackcaps and Chiffchaffs. Was good to see a few butterflies on our wander including plenty of Peacocks, several each of Orange Tip and Comma plus a single tatty Painted Lady. On the way home we paused at the Kennardington crossing to check for Turtle Doves but the noise from a gun club in an adjacent field put paid to any hope of seeing or hearing anything.