29th October

Half term and a week away in Norfolk. Quiet by Norfolk standards, and the winds stubbornly stayed westerly all week, but even a quiet week in Norfolk has its moments.

Lapland and Snow Bunting…

20 species of wader…

Black Brant…

...Cattle and Great White Egret, Marsh & Hen Harrier, Water Pipit, Yellow-browed Warbler and woken each morning by new arrivals of geese…

You also notice the great birdwatching infrastructure and the impact that has on tourism. Something Welcome to Yorkshire should consider given the brilliant birding in the county.

Coming back to Ainderby today was a bit of an anti-climax but saw the first sizeable arrivals of Redwing, a covey of ten Grey Partridge in the top fields and 128 Curlew by the school.

15th October

John came down for the last mothing session of the year last night. In the end it was colder than forecast but still a reasonable catch of 23 different species. The commonest were November moths and Red-line Quakers…

The total included five new ones for the parish. Blair’s Shoulder Knot, Acleris sparsana, Dark Chestnut, Brick…

And Sprawler…

On the birding front it has been a quiet week. Two late Sand Martins were seen over Ainderby last weekend along with at least 50 Pied Wagtails and the first Snipe since the spring. The first Redwings were seen on the 7th…

But they have remained very scarce, in fact significantly outnumbered by Red Admirals which are still around in exceptional numbers. Even more surprising was this Comma seen today, the latest I have ever had one in the village…

In fact birding at work was better than in the village this week with a Grey Wagtail in the car-park, three skeins of Pinkfeet over and a cracking adult Yellow-legged Gull on the playing field.