Catching my drift
So about today then. It was one of those days when I guess a certain amount of hope and expectation was fulfilled, although it was all a bit crazy for a time. I started off by heading to St Fittick's and didn't get any further till late afternoon. Not long after arriving I was confronted by a very striking sounding warbler in the patch of willows between the football pitch and the school fields. After a bit of thinking, listening to recordings and getting brief views I reckoned it must be a
Marsh Warbler, though it wasn't seen for any length of time.
While I was listening to it and trying to get a recording I was aware that another warbler was singing a bit further east along the railway embankment, towards the football pitch. I was focusing on the Marsh Warbler but was aware that this other warbler wasn't familiar. I put the news out, got a call from Mark who was planning to head down, and then I walked back along the embankment, vaguely wondering if the other warbler would be singing again. It was! And after a bit more listening to recordings I started getting a strong inkling that it might be a
Blyth's Reed Warbler.
Mark then appeared and we spent a bit of time listening to it, getting fairly excited and trying to get views of the bird. These were fleeting but then it hopped up onto a prominent twig where it showed better. I only got onto it for a few seconds but Mark was quicker on the draw and got some good shots, which you can see
here. We put the news out and eventually a few more people arrived. It carried on singing right through the middle of the day and into late afternoon, but I don't think it ever showed more than briefly. By late evening everything seemed very quiet and it wasn't heard singing.
The only other bird of note was a singing
Lesser Whitethroat in the scrub near where the Marsh Warbler was. I did have a look round the Ness late in the afternoon, but it was all common birds and we can't be doing with just common birds round here nowadays.
