Stonechat pair

As you may have realised, I’ve been doing exams over the last few weeks, so haven’t been able to do much patch birding. I spent the whole of Tuesday trying to revise in my silverfish infested, prison cell of a bedroom, seeing the reports of all the good seabirds flying by, but not being able to go seawatching! It seems like I might have to wait until the autumn now, as the wind looks to be in the wrong direction for the next two weeks.

In the latest Devon Birds journal issue, there is a section on Stonechats and their breeding behaviour which I found very interesting. So I wanted to see if I could see any evidence of our Stonechats breeding. I found the pair flitting around over the long grass where I've seen them since February I think. I saw the female fly down with her beak full of insects, perch on a bit of grass, and then do a little flick down into the nest. Then she flew back out with a faecal sac which she dropped about 15 metres away from the nest. It’ll be interesting to keep monitoring the nest.

Male Stonechat

I couldn’t find anything unusual in Hackney Marshes. There were just lots of Reed and Sedge Warblers singing. About 11+ Reed and 8+ Sedge around the site (including Passage House).

Sedge Warbler

 Also nice to see were these Roe Deer on the racecourse.

You don't belong there!

The biggest surprise was probably seeing a Little Egret up a tree in the middle of Newton Abbot!

It seems as though the Exe’s Bonaparte's Gull has left now, so shall we say first person to relocate it on the Teign gets a chocolate bar? In the past, a few rare gulls have turned up on the Teign after being seen elsewhere. Only problem is that I haven't seen many Black-headed Gulls on the estuary lately to check through.