Tag: Pett Level
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January-February 2025
A belated roundup of the late winter period, during which pursuit of Water Pipit became a bit of a preoccupation. Combe Valley CP is a known wintering site for the species but they are typically elusive and I struggle to get a handle on numbers. Inspired by a recent British Birds article, I wondered if…
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November-December 2024
November and December can mean only one thing: gulls, and particularly the passage of large gulls which seems to occur in Sussex at this time of year. My impression is that that years passage was more protracted, with numbers never quite reaching the heights of the great westward movements of late December last year. There…
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May 2024 birding roundup
Another month of two halves, the first characterised by fine conditions and the second more unsettled with stronger winds from the SW and N. Birding was exciting and varied, with a number of scarcities augmenting the continued arrival of summer visitors. The first big surprise came early in the month, with a Golden Oriole at…
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March 2024 birding roundup
Spring slowly arrived over the month, with a trickle of migrants throughout and the odd burst of higher intensity movement. A lot of the action was at Combe Valley CP, which, with water levels remaining reasonably high, becomes a very exciting place to bird at this time of year. Eastward Dark-bellied Brent Goose passage was…
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Winter 2023-24 birding roundup
A lamentable absence of blog posts this winter, more due to a lack of time than a lack of good birds seen. In fact, it’s been a great winter for birding locally and in this post I’ll do a highlights roundup of birding Hastings and area from December 2023 through to end of February 2024.…
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October 2023 birding round-up
Better late than never (it does take a while to compile these): a roundup of my October birding Hastings and surrounding area. October was all about vismig as diurnal migrants started to move in numbers along the Sussex coastline. On the ground thrush and crest numbers increased while warbler numbers dwindled. The month was also…
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Convolvulus Hawk-moth at Pett Level, 1 October 2023
At Pett Level on Sunday 1st October I was enjoying a coffee with my partner at the Red Pig food truck in the layby near the pools, when something fluttered past in my peripheral vision. I knew it wasn’t a bird due to the erratic flight style and my first thought, given the size, was…
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September 2023 birding roundup
A busy month with a bit of time away meant less time for birding, but nonetheless there was some great variety and highlights in the best birding month of the year. Particularly exciting has been the increase in visible migration (aka vismig) of many diurnal migrant species, most notably House Martin, Meadow Pipit and Siskin.…
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August 2023 birding roundup
Early autumn passerine migration was the highlight of August, with a nice variety of species present at the local migrant hotspots. I’ve been spending most of my birding time at the enigmatic Hastings Country Park, a local nature reserve which extends along the coast from eastern edge of Hastings to Fairlight. I often hear it…
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June 2023 birding roundup
With Twitter seemingly in steady decline, it feels like the right time to try out a new format for sharing bird sightings and notes (with the added bonus of freedom from word counts). Better late than never, I thought I’d start with a recap of June 2023 birding my Hastings 10k. Dominated by fine and…