Sunday 19 September 2010

19th September 2010 Beachy Head W4 cloud building

Birds trapped in Whitbread Hollow are included in brackets:

Little Egret 1W
Sparrowhawk 2
Merlin 1
Kestrel 8
Sandwich Tern 5W
Great Spotted Woodpecker 2
Skylark 20
Swallow 125 (1)
House Martin 50
Sand Martin 3
Grey Wagtail 4W
Meadow Pipit c.375 (225 moving W)
Tree Pipit 1
Stonechat 7
Wheatear 1
Reed Warbler 1 (1)
Whitethroat 9 (1)
Lesser Whitethroat 1
Blackcap 200 (86)
Garden Warbler 1
Willow Warbler 1
Chiffchaff 435 (118)
Scandinavian Chiffchaff 1 ex. Belle Tout Wood
Spotted Flycatcher 2
Blue Tit 5
indeterminate Treecreeper 1 (1)
Lapland Bunting 3 ex.
Goldfinch 30
Raven 4

Speckeld Wood 8
Comma 2
Red Admiral 5
Lapland Bunting over the Top Fields

Little Egret off Cow Gap Beach

The Ringing Hut in Whitbread Hollow

Scandinavian Chiffchaff P.c. abietinus in Belle Tout Wood
A black-billed, black-legged colourless Chiffchaff for surprisingly early in the season. With its greyish-brown upperparts, pale ear-coverts and whitish underparts (including white undertail-coverts) this bird certainly proved immediately arresting amongst the accompanyingcollybita. In addition, it frequently uttered a monosyllabic 'cheeep' call, being reminiscent, although to my mind louder, than tristis. Such distinctive individuals are normally assigned to eastern populations of abietinus. Found unfortunately late in the day, the above image was obtained in the poor light of Belle Tout Wood, so fails to convey quite how distinctive this individual appeared in the field, although it is worth comparing its cold-toned plumage with a typical September collybita below:

Chiffchaff P.c. collybita photographed on 12th September 2009

Spotted Flycatcher in Belle Tout Wood