Notes from the valley

With recent weekends booked up with stag do's and visiting family, I was looking forward to a short break in The Lakes with Debs and my family to blow out the cobwebs and hopefully do some casual birding in different surrounds. I was both pleased and surprised at how common Wood Warblers were on the Beech and Oak covered slopes of the hills. Still using my temporary camera until Thailand when we will purchase a new model, so no photos of the birds themselves despite crippling views! What stonking birds these are. Instead, a photo of typical Wood Warbler habo will have to do: I also picked up a lovely male Redstart on an 8 mile walk from High Dam to Bowness, always a delight to see and again not a bird that breeds widely in Norfolk (Wood Warbler not at all of course). Tree Pipit were encountered twice in cleared areas at the edge of forest, and a cacophony of alarm calls led me to a Tawny Owl in dense scrub nearby. Around Windermere, we had Red Kite over, 2 Mandarin, 2 Com...

Having not felt myself for a while, birding time has been limited but having said that I have still added species to both my patch and British life lists! Such is the luck of living and birding in this fine county. Back at the start of the month, Debs and I were treated to views of at least 4 Hobby over Claxton and Rockland marshes hawking for insects. I was pleased to see at least one was still in situ last night when I dropped in for a late evening visit. I finally scored with a Garden Warbler at Rockland, and at least 2 Common Tern were still present and thankfully this species is usually present throughout the summer despite not breeding. A real highlight of the month so far has been connecting with the Pectoral Sandpiper at Buckenham, from Claxton! I could see some birders across the river and figured Ricky may be one of them, so I phoned him and after waving manically at each other he managed to get me onto the Pec. Top man! As you can imagine views were distant but compared with...