NORTH DOWNS & BEYOND

I'm now well into week four of the 'Uberpatch Meteorological Autumn' project and will wait until the end of September before going through the highs and lows that have been experienced. I have been doing a lot of sky-watching, or vis-migging if you prefer that description, and this has opened up avenues of pleasure, frustration and bewilderment, especially in trying to understand what weather conditions are best to witness a decent movement and where I'm best to position myself to do so. It isn't straight forward! I have a number of 'go-to' places to practice this dark art and all can produce the goods. In rough order of prominence they are: Denbies Hillside; Colley Hill; Box Hill; Epsom Downs; my Banstead garden; Canons Farm; and Priest Hill. Apart from my garden all have great viewing conditions (open sky, long horizons) although Box and Colley Hill lack decent northward views. This post is a distillation of what I think I know about autumn bird movements...

On August 14th this year I found a bright green Shieldbug in the MV moth trap which I was pretty sure was a new species for me - not the common Green (Palomino prasina) but the far more localised Southern Green (Nezara viridula), a species that has been increasing in eastern and southern parts of England since the turn of the millennium. The photograph below illustrates nicely the presence of white dots at the front of the scutellum, an identification pointer for viridula . Then a few days ago an unfamiliar insect landed on my arm as I was making a cup of tea in the kitchen. After quickly potting it up I was able to identify it - with old-fashioned perusal of field guides (albeit on-line) - as a mid-instar Southern Green! I think you might agree that this younger stage knocks its final appearance into a cocked hat.

It is just over a year since I took possession of my hearing aids - obtained because I had lost the ability to hear high-end frequency sounds which includes the calls of Swifts, Redwings, Tree Pipits (all unless they are close) plus most grasshoppers and crickets - and if I want to be completist, also some annoying human-manufactured bleeps and pulses that accompany certain electrical goods (but thankfully not fire or smoke alarms!) I only use them when vis-migging where the ability to hear calls is quite a plus point. However, since using them I am just as mindful to leave them in their cases. Here's why... When I first tried my hearing aids out in the field it was really eye-opening (or should that be ear-opening). I could hear sounds that I didn't know existed. I stood at the top of the garden and marvelled at the bird calls that were audible. I took the ear pieces out and was at once plunged into a muffled semi-silence - yes I could hear a Robin calling and a nearby Great T...

The rather grandly named 'Uberpatch Meterological Autumn Birding Blitz 2026' - or 'UMA26' for short - kicked off at 05.40hrs at Reigate Hill on Tuesday 1st September. Since then I have had five days worth of the project, with most of them providing a good eight-nine hours of birding. The next few days will see a slight lessening of hours in the field as I still need to conduct a 'normal' life alongside that of trying to wring out plenty of ornithological action. However, spare moments will see me staring skywards and there will still be plenty of local excursions. The birding has been undeniably slow, which is to be expected, any days of action more of a welcome bonus. The real aim of this folly is to prove to myself, and interested others, that wherever you look, if you look regularly and diligently enough then rewards will come, be those rewards in the guise of scarcity, number or just the pleasure that such an undertaking can bring. So far there has been no c...

I've mentioned this saying several times on this blog, but it is one that I come back to time and again. It is: 'Comparison is the thief of joy' When I first heard it I wasn't really sure what it was on about. Then I gave it a bit of thought. Then I got it. We are easily persuaded that what is going on elsewhere is better than what we are experiencing in the here and now. The birds that are being seen. The moths that are being trapped. The weather. People having a good time. You get my drift. What you have set out before you can then lessen in quality and shrink in meaning - if you allow it to do so. After having been on a short holiday with my wife last week I was planning on going down to Dungeness for 10 days, staying at the Bird Observatory. Everything was lined up. At the last moment I pulled out. I still don't know why, but I didn't have the drive, the oomph, the wanting to. So I stayed at home. I then decided to book into the said observatory for a three ...

A week to go until the launch of my 'meteorological autumn birding blitz' and since I committed myself by announcing it on social media I have been humbled by the response - OK, maybe not hundreds of correspondents but at least a dozen birders have commented on the undertaking and all have sent words of kindness and encouragement. In fact one of them (north-Kent's very own Kevin Thornton) even wrote a poem/hymn in its honour, which I share with you below - with the author's blessing. Something that I am eternally grateful for is that even after 50+ years of birding I can still get excited and enthusiastic about local, simple birding. I know plenty who cannot stomach time with their optics unless they are at a hotbed of ornithological action. I do get it, I have slipped into this mindset myself in the past. That I have chosen to plough a relatively lonely and local furrow rather than hit the Kent shingle this autumn was actually an easy choice in the end. In all honesty ...