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Thursday 2 September 2010

Black-throated Diver

With light northeasterlies a check round the patch produced a Redstart and a Whinchat at Sidestrand, and at least 3 Swifts still up by the lighthouse.
Also whilst at Sidestrand I noticed the top of a pair of ears just sticking up above the stubble in a field and initially thought it was going to be a hare, but getting closer I could see more of the ears and a bit a reddish fur and my thoughts changed to it maybe being a fox, but when approaching it further and could see more of it, I realised it was infact a Chinese Water Deer having a bit of a snooze.

A check of the sea in the evening produced adult and immature Med Gulls past, good numbers of Sandwich Terns roosting on the groynes, plus 4 Common Sandpipers on the beach. However the undoubted highlight was a Diver Sp. that I picked up through my bins as it headed west, and quickly getting it in the scope I was very pleasantly surprised to see that it was a summer plumaged Black-throated, an excellent record for the patch, and probably the first summer plumaged bird that I have ever recorded in the county.