26th April

Bird of the week was undoubtedly the Hobby which I first saw as an interesting, but unidentified, blob in one of the huge arable fields down Greenhills Lane. It eventually took off and gave some good views although you would never guess from the single photo I managed!!

This is the earliest I have had in the parish. Other migration has been generally slow with the village swallows only really back in any numbers this week. An early Lesser Whitethroat was on Langlands on 19th and I had four birds singing down Greenhills Lane yesterday. My first Common Whitethroat was on 23rd but again they were widespread by my walk this morning…   

No Swifts yet although they have been seen over Scruton and I thought I had one over Morton this morning, in fact it was a distant Hobby, presumably the bird from yesterday.

Other things from my morning walk today…

A socially-isolating Grey Heron…

Two pairs of Buzzards which are common now but are still a thrill to see, particularly when they are performing their display flight.

And this smart little insect with, in flight, a brilliant yellow abdomen. I think it’s one of the nomad bees but it's hard to distinguish the species…

The only other birds added to my village year list this week have been a single Snipe and Red-legged Partridge (a species I didn't see at all last year)…

18th April

Despite the sunny weather the winds have been distinctly chilly and this probably accounts for the relatively low numbers of summer visitors so far. I have had half a dozen Swallows through the village but all have fed and departed and ‘our’ breeding birds haven’t arrived so far.

What was a nice find was a group of four Yellow Wagtails which dropped onto a remnant puddle of floodwater down Greenhills Lane…

They are one of my favourite summer visitors and I spotted other Yellows near Langlands and on the potato fields to the north of Ainderby.

These fields also attracted rarer visitors in the form of two White Wagtails. These are the continental form of our familiar Pied Wagtail and very smart birds with a pale grey back and clean white flanks and underparts. It’s likely these birds are en-route to Iceland.

These represented the first confirmed sightings for the village

This Skylark was also photographed there, not a rare bird but it’s unusual to get a good view of these birds on the ground…

I mentioned last week about the temporary local wader habitat. Unfortunately as predicted it looks as though  dehydration is going to outstrip migration but I did have one nice find, this Ringed Plover on the pool near Langlands. 

This bird dropped in on Tuesday evening for ten minutes before climbing high and away to the south and it was pure luck that we were in the right place at the right time. It does make you wonder how much must pass through unseen each week…

Other sightings over the last few days included two Wheatear in fields down Greenhills Lane and two Red Kite near Thrintoft both spotted by Jim and Sue. Hazel watched a Kestrel trying to rob a Barn Owl of its prey near Morton bridge and I had a flock of 120 Golden Plover in a field down Potter Lane.  Most were in their striking breeding plumage but unfortunately too distant to get anything other than a blurry record shot…

12th April

It has been ages since I posted anything (a combination of inertia, work but mainly lack of birds!) but in these strange times connection with nature seems more important than ever. A couple of regular readers have also prodded me into action so I will try and get back to a regular pattern again.

What has been noticeable is the number of people now walking around the village, for example I have quite literally seen more people on Langlands in the last three weeks than in the previous thirty years combined. Perhaps we might see more people taking an interest in the wildlife of the parish in the future?  

In terms of birds it has been pretty quiet but we have seen the first summer migrants over the last few days. The earliest was Chiffchaff with singing birds from 20th March. The first Sand Martins were on the river from 25^th March, a Blackcap was singing behind our house on 7^th April and I heard a Willow Warbler the following day. Jim and Sue had two Swallows over the Garth in Ainderby on 7^th and a bird was hawking over our garden on the 8th but I have not heard of any sightings since.

Migration generally has been poor with, despite sunny weather, the cold winds possibly being the cause. This is evidenced by regular sightings still of Meadow Pipits which are always an indicator of slowed migration. This included a tight little flock of 35+ in one of the meadows on Langlands…

Pick of the birds though was a cracking cock Redstart seen on the evening of the 10^th (a nice birthday present!). This was one of only a handful of sightings in the parish and only the second adult male. Unfortunately this terrible picture in the evening light does not do the bird justice!

My early morning walk yesterday was disappointing with around 30 Sand Martins, ten Chiffchaffs and three Willow Warblers the only summer migrants seen. What was positive though was to see a singing Corn Bunting on the edge of Ainderby itself, this is the first for four or five years. Altogether on my walk I had an encouraging nine singing males of this species which has seen such a dramatic decline in numbers.

Two of these were singing from oil seed rape and it will be interesting to see if they adapt to this crop as Reed Buntings seem to have done…

Last weekend there was an unusual movement of Jays over the parish. I picked up 10 going over Greenhills Lane and Chris Knight had another group of five over Thrintoft at the same time. So it’s interesting to speculate on the total numbers involved.

For once we have some interesting looking areas of wader habitat in the parish, remnants of the winter flooding...

but they are drying fast and it is going to be a tight race between wader migration getting in full swing and these sites retaining water. The pickings have been slim so far with a single Redshank on the Langlands pool…

And a Green Sandpiper on the pool between Ainderby and Thrintoft. This latter site also attracted thirty Teal, Shelduck, a pair of Goosander and (a real Ainderby rarity!) a pair of Coot.  

One of the pleasures of my daily lockdown stroll has been the regular sightings of Hares with up to fourteen seen on a single walk.

These have included one Rumble in the Jungle boxing match where they were really going at it,whilst this pair today were aggressively chasing off Carrion Crows (by charging at them with their ears bent forward) so I suspect they have some leverets secreted somewhere in the field…