NORTH DOWNS & BEYOND

The 2019 Surrey v Northumberland patch competition has taken a distinct northern upturn over the past couple of months, with Stewart Sexton having had a tremendous September, adding 12 species to his total, bringing his 'percentage total of personal patch list' up to 75.24% - most impressive. On the other hand, down here in Uber-patch Surrey, my two September additions - Honey Buzzard and Pintail, have limped my comparable score up to 62.44%. The words 'arsed' and 'spanked' spring to mind. I'm not throwing in the towel just yet. Three months to go, and I hope that my luck will change. Rather than chase everything on offer (there have been chances to add to my score) I have taken the route of 'self-finding' as a more enjoyable way of reaching the destination. I hope that the final three months will see some additions, even if they do not bring about an overhauling of Stewart's score.

A mad half-hour in the skies above the back garden here in Surrey. At 11.45hrs I happened to glance out of a window and saw a handful of hirundines in view. I grabbed the binoculars and walked out to the stirring sight of an enormous flock of House Martins, slowly making their way south-eastwards. They were widely scattered and numbered at least 700 birds. The morning had been very wet, with pulses of heavy rain driven by a blustery south-westerly wind, and this flock was passing through on such a pulse. I kept my eyes to the skies and was rewarded half-an-hour later by another 250 House Martins, heading on a more south-westerly bearing - this was also during another burst of heavy rain. Over the following three hours, and with a gradual improvement in the weather, the hirundine stream didn’t stop, but certainly was not as spectacular. A total of 1175 was the final total. There does seem to be a clear line of movement across my immediate local area. Between our house and Nork Park, m...

We are in the full swing of Stonechat passage that is enjoyed during each 'mid-autumn' period. This year seems to be a good one for this most charismatic of chats, with multiple counts and obvious turnover at several sites. Over the past few days I have observed: Canons Farm: one (a female) on 15th; three (all males) on 16th; three (two males, one female) on 17th; six (two males and four females) on 19th. Mogador: six (two males and four females) on 17th Priest Hill: five (all females) on 18th; six (two males, four females) on 19th. Epsom Downs: seven (two males, five females) on 20th. As can be seen, by keeping a note on the sexual composition of the flocks, there is some turnover going on, that sometimes the numbers can only hint at. Just because five birds become six birds the following day does not necessarily mean that just a single new bird has arrived - they could all be different! Although the species does breed in the county (mostly on the western heath...

A local day's birding that didn't promise much but ended up being one of great interest. Throughout the day, cloudless blue skies meant that if anything was moving through the area it was high - I picked up a number of passerines too far up to specifically identify, all heading south, and I suspect that they were mostly pipits. This was slightly born out by the number of Meadow Pipits found in the fields at Canons Farm (40) and Mogador (70). The other 'species of the day' were Stonechats, with three at Canons Farm (different from yesterday) and six at Mogador (two males). The latter site also held a male Common Redstart, with Colley Hill also chipping in with a female type plus a Whinchat. Mogador is not a site that crops up regularly on the birding map. It occupies high ground just inland from the scarp slope of the North Downs (at Colley Hill.) It is open farmland (arable and cattle) with thin ribbons of low vegetation with small groups of bushes for good measure...

* hat doffed to one J. Lydon Esq, Flowers of Romance, PiL And that is exactly how I found myself at 06.20hrs this morning, ready for a morning of scintillating visible migration watching. By 08.20hrs I came to the belated conclusion that the birds had not read the script. A force two westerly wind, with 7/8 cloud cover, was never going to be the recipe for a memorable movement, and this was not helped by a 0/8 sky just to the north. Four House Martins heading south and two Swallows west was it as far as 'true' movement went, a pitiful return. And here are the views that were on offer from my vantage point, a third of the way down from the peak, just west of the viewpoint. Looking east, along the line of the North Downs. Gatwick Airport is out on that flat bit somewhere. Looking due south across Dorking (cue guffaws from our American friends). The River Mole is just before the closest housing. The Greensand ridge is in the distance - and here be dragons the Le...

This morning, while waiting for a big hirundine/pipit day, and daydreaming about big thrush days to come, I spent some time on the shores of the northern lake at Beddington SF, watching a group of four Whinchat, a Stonechat and a female Common Redstart. Another Whinchat was found on the Beddington park border. Not a lot was passing overhead although five Sand Martin and two Common Swift were noteworthy.

Denbigh's Hillside on a warm and sunny morning is a delightful place to be. It has the lot - scenery, plants, butterflies and birds. The main purpose of my visit was to monitor the butterflies that were still on the wing. We are coming to the end of many of their flight times, and, for some species, today may well have been my last chance to observe them in 2019. Numbers were quite low considering how good the weather conditions were, with the commonest 'blue' being Adonis (although they still didn't reach double figures and were by and large tatty) but in contrast the only two Silver-spotted Skippers seen were still very fresh. It was a good morning for raptors. At least 15 Common Buzzards were in the area, and among them, for a good 10-15 minutes, was a female Goshawk, loafing around before coming in directly over my head and off towards Ranmore Common. This was 'top-trumped' by a Honey-buzzard that appeared with a Common, but then peeled away an...