Monday 6th October 2025.
What an amazing morning for ‘visible migration’! Sadly, the Moths were very low in numbers this morning, but what I lacked in Moths, the birds flying overhead made up for that. At 7.20am this morning, the sky was covered in high cloud, but by 8.30am, the cloud had disappeared to the east, leaving behind a bright blue sky and wall to wall sunshine. It even warmed up a bit too as it topped 18 degrees centigrade, with next to no wind at all.
My Moth Box:
This Large Yellow Underwing was only one of two macro moths!
There were just 10 moths of 8 species present this morning, which was very disappointing and even the micro moths well outnumbered the macro moths for a change! Two Common Masoner’s and a Pale-backed Detritus Moth were new for October, though nothing this morning to get too excited about.
The Micro moth Pale-backed Detritus Moth.
The Moths recorded this morning were as follows:
MACRO MOTHS | MICRO MOTHS |
|
|
Large Yellow Underwing x1 | Pale-backed Detritus Moth x1 |
Double-striped Pug x1 | Common Masoner x2 |
| Ruddy Streak x1 |
| Light Brown Apple Moth x1 |
| Common Plume x2 |
| Beautiful Plume x1 |
The ‘Vis Mig’ however, was a different scenario altogether. There was what seemed a constant stream of Meadow Pipits going over with flock after flock going through and a lot of them flew very low overhead. Better was to come when I heard my first Lesser Redpoll of the year and I was lucky enough to watch a calling bird flying east over the rooftops. Could it get better? I then heard the distinctive calls of Crossbills and sure enough, a flock of 10 birds flew low over the house heading west! Incredible stuff. Though not a ‘garden first’ as I have seen this species over my house before, a Reed Bunting was as it flew over the house heading west. October is a month that can be full of surprises and this morning was one of those. A high flying House Martin was heard and then seen also flying westbound.
The Hoverfly Common Globetail (Sphaerophoria scripta). It is not a Hoverfly species that I regularly get in my garden and this one was on my Moth Box.
The species of birds didn't stop there either for other birds noted included a flock of 4 Chaffinches heading south, several flocks of Siskins, a flock of 4 Linnets heading south and a pair of Pied Wagtails heading north! A pair of Grey Wagtails flew over my road when I was making my way to the car! If I had the morning off, what else was going to fly over?
Pembroke Road, Old Portsmouth:
A beautiful start to the week and a busy bird day too.
An impressive 20 species were seen or heard from Pembroke Road this morning on my first shift! This included numerous Meadow Pipits and Siskins going over, with smaller numbers of Skylarks, Linnets, a single Goldfinch, Chiffchaff and several Pied Wagtails going over. A pair of Jays flew in to land in the trees by the Bowling Green to add to this morning's variety. It can be simply amazing that one small part of Portsmouth can produce so many species of birds in such a short space of time; but October is well known for that as both the summer and winter birds are now on the move.
The species seen here today included the following:
- Herring Gull
- Black-headed Gull
- Wood Pigeon
- Feral Pigeon
- Magpie
- Carrion Crow
- Jay
- Pied Wagtail
- Meadow Pipit
- Grey Wagtail
- Chaffinch
- Goldfinch
- Linnet
- Skylark
- Siskin
- Wren
- Robin
- Blue Tit
- Great Tit
- Blackbird
On my afternoon shift at Pembroke Road, there was still a trickle of Meadow Pipits and Siskins flying over and a Chiffchaff was seen briefly. While driving around Portsmouth around lunchtime, I saw a male Sparrowhawk being harassed by a Carrion Crow to add to today’s species seen.
This 1st winter male Siberian Thrush had 'twitchers' scambling for a view of this extremely rare thrush. It was found at Loch of Asta, in the Shetlands. Photos by Will Bowell.
No comments:
Post a Comment