A warm April day

Hello

As forecast a much warmer day and with some nice sunshine too brought forth a number of insects and the birds were in full voice.

There were no reported positive sightings of the Purple Heron at Stanford Reservoir today and in some  respects it was Harrington Airfield that stole the show with the remaining female Ring Ouzel around Bunker Three, a low profile male Common Redstart near Bunker One and a Short-eared Owl again this evening.

Two Cattle Egrets and a Great White Egret were at Summer Leys LNR, three Little Ringed Plovers were on Earls Barton New Workings and two Common Sandpipers and two Wheatears were at Clifford Hill Pits. A Nightingale was at Stanwick Pits this morning, along the old railway line between the A6 road bridge and the main car park and a Grasshopper Warbler was 'reeling' on the other side of the A6 near to the Greenway Bridge over the River Nene on the Irthlingborough Lakes and Meadows reserve at Ditchford Pits.

An Arctic Tern remained at Eyebrook Reservoir, there was a pair of Mandarin Ducks in the Welland Valley below Middleton and at Hollowell Reservoir an Osprey flew south this afternoon and two Common Sandpipers were on the dam.

A Brambling was at Braunston and two Ravens and a Kingfisher were near Cottesbrooke village. Blueberry Farm near Maidwell continued to host a Short-eared Owl today where there were also two Wheatears, and two Short-eared Owls re-appeared west of Lamport after a day's absence. At least two Siskins were feeding in a garden on the eastern outskirts of Northampton.

Regards

Neil M

Great Spotted Woodpecker.

Brown Hare.

Muntjac.

All images courtesy
of Tony Stanford and
from Pitsford Reservoir
today.