Gotcha, You Little Varmint!

Last weekend happily began on Friday, with yet another early trip to the Nose. It was a bit quiet, something to do with all the sunshine and wind, I think.

3 Blackcaps and 2 Chiffchaffs in the bushes, and overhead parties of finches with two groups of larks [unseen] and one of alba wagtails.

My visit was not without interest and incident, and me messing up again. But more on that later.

For the good stuff we skip ahead to near the end, when checking up the South Side from Sandy Point revealed that sneaky Blackstart messing about the boulders of the beach again.

This time his mobility paid against him, as he mistakenly perched where I could see him and at less than 30m for once!

Black Redstart

1cy male

Heh heh heh...

"Is he looking at me??"

Observe the notably dark face, one of the first signs of male plumage to appear. [The strong tail pattern is also a pro-male feature, I believe].

Now that I'm all smug and 'told you so it was a male', time to self-deflate somewhat.

Mere moments earlier, I'd been scanning the Lead Stone [you need multiple angles] for any non-Oyk waders and picked up something with a white belly, dark uppers, strong breast band and pale face. Turnstone, thinks I [smaller than Oyk too, btw].

 

Right?

 

Have a look,

"That's no moon..."

Hmm, bit greenish above for Turnstone... Bit long in the tail, too. Quite a square-looking head.

That'd be a Lapwing, then.

!!!!!!!!!

Patch Year Tick, but what the frilly fringes of Farnborough was it doing there?!?!? I think I have seen Lapwing flying over the Nose in [very] cold weather movements of winters long past, but not for a lonnnnng time. Parties inland are usually the only Patch fare, and then rarely.

Ahem.

[["Doesn't know the difference between a Lapwing and a Turnstone??"   I could point out the difference between a 30x camera [plus digital zoom, cropping, great big computer screen] and 10x bins, but I fear I saw what I expected to see....]]

I guess it wandered around to the Far Side [now I think having to be an actual place] or of course flew off before the Teacher arrived with The Artefact in the afternoon...??

Also in the sights;

Little Egret

Blushing Waxcap

Cedarwood Waxcap

[Rant Alert, You May Wish To Skip This Paragraph]

Later in the day I had cause to be up Exeter way, and looked to stop in to a couple of old haunts [oh how times have changed], to find to my great annoyance the xenophobes have been at it again. There does seem to be an ongoing campaign to keep the peons out of places like Topsham; 'If you can't afford to live here, or in cycling range, then we don't want you coming in, eh?'. And not far away, another birders' [and locals, I suppose far more commonly] parking place has been closed off; short-sighted as the turnover of traffic is a major deterrent to thieves for whom a car park close to but out of sight of a busy road is a tempting target...

I shouldn't rant, but it was so galling having to turn away from two sites as I couldn't find anywhere I was allowed to park.

Ahem.

Anyways, I got that pesky Blackstart, and a bird I didn't realise I had, so not all bad.

Then there was the next day.

I had plans, you see. Something to do.

Be Seeing You...