20 Oct 19

Priorslee Lake and The Flash

Priorslee Lake:  06:25 –09:15
The Flash:  09:20 – 10:10

6.0°C > 8.0°C:  Broken medium-level cloud cleared away for a while. Keen, moderate NNW wind. Very good visibility.

Sunrise: 07:44 BST

Priorslee Lake:  06:25 –09:15

(249th visit of the year)

Busy overhead though no large numbers with birds passing in just about every direction.

Other bird notes from today:
- A pair of Pochard new in.
- Two Cormorants arrived from the NE together with one carrying on and just the one landing.
- One of the immature large gulls was another very pale-headed bird suggesting it could be a Yellow-legged Gull. I needed to see the pattern of the spread-wings before claiming it as such.
- At least four Song Thrushes seemed to leave roosts around the lake.
- Of the 38 Redwings noted overhead 31 were in a group. All the others – ones and twos – could conceivably have come from trees in the area. Later four were seen landing in trees around the lake.
- A few Greenfinches are often seen flying about and I presume these to be local birds. Today’s group of eight seemed to be flying ‘with a mission’.

Bird totals:

Birds noted flying over or flying near the lake:
- 11 Greylag Geese (2 groups inbound)
- 7 unidentified geese (1 group inbound)
- 1 Cormorant
- 5 Black-headed Gulls
- 6 Lesser Black-backed Gulls: all adults
- 27 large gulls while still too dark to ID
- 2 Stock Doves
- 71 Wood Pigeons: 62 of these in six migrant groups
- c.200 Jackdaws
- 12 Starlings (1 group)
- 3 Skylarks
- 38 Redwings
- 7 Pied Wagtails at least
- 1 Meadow Pipit
- 8 Greenfinches
- 3 Siskins
- 1 Linnet

Birds logged leaving roosts around the lake:
Again Reed Buntings were heard calling from their roost but none was seen to leave.
- 18 Starlings
- 4 Song Thrushes
- 8 Redwing

Warblers noted:
- 1 Chiffchaff calling

Counts from the lake area:
- 2 + 5 (1 brood) Mute Swans
- 4 (2♂) Gadwall still
- 12 (?♂) Mallard: all but three (two ♂♂ ) flew off
- 2 (1♂) Pochard
- 37 (10?♂) Tufted Ducks
- 1 Cormorant
- 3 Grey Herons once more
- Little Grebe(s) heard only
- 12 Great Crested Grebes: ages not determined
- 8 Moorhens
- 112 Coots
- >55 Black-headed Gulls
- 18 Lesser Black-backed Gulls: 11 of these first-winter birds
- 10 Herring Gulls: nine of these first-winter birds
- 1 probable first-winter Yellow-legged Gull

Pre-dawn sightings on the lamp poles:
- 1 Rhomboid Tortrix moth (Acleris rhombana)
- 6 November Moth-types (Epirrita sp.)
- 1 Mottled Umber moth (Erranis defoliaria)
- 2 Chironomus plumosus (plumed midges)
- 1 Common Stretch-spider (Tetragnatha extensa)
- 2 other unidentified species of spider
- 1 Paroligolophus agrestis harvestman

Later sightings:
- 2 probable Trichocera regelationis craneflies again

Today’s only Cormorant. It flew towards the lake in company with another that flew straight on. The white on the belly indicates it is an immature. Rather scruffy too.

Pose right in front of me so ... an adult winter Black-headed Gull of course. The bill only has the black tip in winter.

This is the putative immature Yellow-legged Gull with a paler than usual head. Some grey in the feathers on the mantle suggest this is not a first-winter bird yet the (massive) bill still looks all black. Positive ID would, for me, require the pattern of the flight-feathers to be seen and I did not see this bird arrive or leave. Could not enlarge the photo any more without it hopelessly pixelating

‘Only’ a female Chaffinch. Apart from singing males in the breeding season I do not see too many Chaffinches around the lake.

Three for the price of one. The moth is a Rhomboid Tortrix (Acleris rhombana), one of the easier tortrix moths to identify even though it is variable in colour and in marking. It always shows the reticulated background. The other two are Chironomus plumosus (plumed midges). And no: that is not a tadpole up a lamp pole – an old bird-dropping I suspect.

Three for the price of one again. Top right is a Mottled Umber moth (Erranis defoliaria). On the left is a November Moth-type (Epirrita sp.). The small spider approaching the Mottled Umber is either hopeful, hungry or both.

Now THIS is what a Common Stretch-spider (Tetragnatha extensa) should look like. It is none too well camouflaged here on a lamp pole. Usually they lie in wait along the ‘spine’ of leaves ready to ensnare passing insects.

Hedge massacre. Why? The result is hardly neat and tidy. By coincidence a post on another web-site included a poem decrying this sort of vandalism. I am not a fan of poetry, nor of Pam Ayres who is the author. But it seems so apposite that I am infringing copyright no doubt ...

“How sad on this October day
To see our hedges shorn away
Small creatures would have liked to eat,
The hawthorn berries, rose hips sweet,
Blackberries and nuts and sloes,
But through the blades the banquet goes,
Won’t somebody heed our words,
And leave the berries for the birds.”
© Pam Ayres

(Ed Wilson)

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The Flash:  09:20 – 10:10

(236th visit of the year)

Notes from here:
- Another increase in number of Tufted Ducks, especially after 25 birds flew in together, presumably relocating from the lake as the yachts were launched there.
- Only two Great Crested Grebes located.
- The larger number of Black-headed Gulls seemed to have been attracted by the fishermen’s bait being cast.

Birds noted flying over / near The Flash:
- 1 Sparrowhawk again
- 13 Wood Pigeons
- 20 Jackdaws
- 3 Skylarks
- 3 Starlings
- 1 Meadow Pipit
- 18 Goldfinches

Counts from the water:
- 3 Mute Swans
- >18 Greylag Geese: lots of noise from unseen birds inside the island
- 24 Canada Geese: 40 of these arrived
- no hybrid / feral geese
- 33 (18♂) Mallard
- 69 > 94 (?♂) Tufted Duck
- 2 Great Crested Grebes only
- no Moorhens
- 13 Coots
- 37 Black-headed Gulls
- 1 Kingfisher

Other things:
-       on the usual lamp pole
- 1 November Moth-type (Epirrita sp.). My 24th moth species here in 2019
- male and female Tipula pagana craneflies
-        elsewhere
- 1 November Moth-type (Epirrita sp.)
- 1 Paroligolophus agrestis harvestman
-       nothing in squirrel alley

Two for the price of one here. On the right a November Moth-type (Epirrita sp.). On the left a cranefly. It is a female Tipula pagana, a species where the female has much-reduced wings and cannot fly.

In close-up we can just about make out the short wings.

And here is likely her suitor looking the worse for wear with only three legs.

In close-up we see the typical cranefly ‘beak’ – properly a ‘snout’ usually with a small beak-like projection.

In real close-up. I have been trying, without success, to find out what the globular-ended projections from the base of the thorax are called and what they are for. You can even count the number of segments in the antennae here.

And in plan view.

(Ed Wilson)

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On this day..........

2018
Priorslee Lake
Today's Sightings Here

2017
Priorslee Lake
Today's Sightings Here

2015
Priorslee Lake
Today's Sightings Here

2010
Priorslee Lake
Water Rail heard
>500 Black-headed Gulls
>530 migrating Wood Pigeons
(Ed Wilson)

2009
Priorslee Lake
1 Little Grebe
65 Mute Swans
7 Wigeon
7 Herring Gulls
1 Yellow-legged Gull
47 Greylag Geese
56 Canada Geese
9 Pochard
19 Tufted Ducks
1 Water Rail
236 Coots
4 Buzzards
Chiffchaff 
27 Starlings
(Ed Wilson)

2007
Priorslee Lake
Water Rail
Goldeneye
100 Fieldfare
(John Isherwood)