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Message: <blockquote data-quote="JWN Andrewes" data-source="post: 3546322" data-attributes="member: 7131">April 2ndCheers Swindon Addick. We're going to be spending a weekend in June camping near Otmoor, so it's already on my radar in the event Turtle Doves have eluded us by then. Had a look last year but by all accounts we were somewhat unlucky, what with everyone else on site having seen them earlier in the day. That was end of July, so getting a bit late in the season perhaps.And so to today, with a return engagement with the Marbury Lesser-spotted Woodpeckers, this time in much nicer weather! Our meanderings through the woods yielded up numerous Nuthatches, Treecreepers and Great-spots scouring various calibres of tree limb, but thanks to a little prior knowledge (thanks Zoot) and some on site birders we were able to narrow our search area and eventually it was Sam, while the rest of us were distracted by a cloud of Sand Martins massing just above the tree tops, who was left to call "Woodpecker! Woodpecker! Woodpecker!" (sotto voce) when the female eventually came into view. Twenty some years ago I could have reeled off at least three good Lesser-spot sites within three or four miles of where I lived near Chester, even had it as a garden regular, but nowadays, without Marbury, I wouldn't know where to begin, beyond two isolated records along the Alyn near where I live now, and that's in the last eleven years. Shame. Blackcap was also new for the year.</blockquote>