BirdForum

The weather recently hasn't been very helpful to me and so birding opportunities have been a little few-and-far-between of late. However, a few hours of calm before the storm last Saturday morning allowed me to get over to West Beach/Climping Gap. Walking there down the west bank of the Arun, the usual gulls roosting on top of tall wooden posts were joined by a solitary Redshank. And a reasonably-sized flock of roosting Black-headed Gulls had a single Common Gull amongst it, which I was able...

Stoggler

I finally had the opportunity to spend a day birding yesterday, wrapping up warm and going to visit the WWT centre at Barnes for the first time in over a month.

Getting there as the centre opened at 9.30, it was a chilly overcast day with a few showers although the sun did come out about 2.30 onwards which made the end of the day better.

The usual array of resident ducks (mallard, tufties), swans and geese as well as wintering ducks such as teal, shoveler, wigeon. ...

Stoggler

October was a bit of an odd month birding-wise. In total I saw 62 species, just three fewer than the previous month, but what was odd was that I saw all those birds by the 17th of the month, with no new species after that date. This was down to not being able to get out and go birding at all after that date. As I'm discovering, trying to fit in time to go birding between a full working week and commitments with friends and family is not easy. To illustrate the point, counting up the number of...

Stoggler

Unfortunately birding opportunities seem to be very few and fair between at the moment. Because I work 9-to-5 Monday-to-Friday, and because of the shorter days and clocks going back, weekends seem to be the only chance to get to do some serious birding. However, even that's been curtailed of late what with wedding planning and some naff weather.

Last Saturday was a case in point - Saturday mornings are for me usually the best chance all week to get out and see some birds, but...

Stoggler

A nice calm autumnal Saturday morning found me walking in the West Beach/Climping Gap area near Littlehampton, and it was a wonderful morning's birding for me.

What was immediately evident was that there were a significant number of Swallows about, especially once I got past the golf course to the sand dunes: a few dozen Swallows were flying around catching their last bland British meals before hopping of to France and further south for I'm sure some heat and better cuisine (and who...

Stoggler