Of Birds & Cake the Blog of Paul

Monday, 20 July 2026

Healing Patch Walk

I made the mistake on Saturday of not getting up early and going birding, leaving me vulnerable to other ideas. Trousers are required says Margie, so off we go shopping😢 needless to say 15 hours and 200 quid later we return home, with no trousers 😢😂 At this point Margie would like me to clarify that the 200 quid was spent on my clothes and the whole trip was less than 2 hours!! In my defence that is my bi-annual shopping budget! Anyway to cope with the trauma I spent a couple of hours on the Albourne Road Patch, my first visit for a couple of years after the local farmer trashed most of the good habitat, to be honest I'm not sure why the hedge and bushes were grubbed out, nothing seems to have been done with the field!

All in all it wasn't a bad walk around, Green and Great Spotted Woodpecker, families of Chiffchaff and Common Whitethroats seen, Bullfinch heard but overall quiet on the bird front, it's that time of year and the time of day didn't help either. Probably the highlight was a load of Beautiful Demoiselles near a bridge over Cutlers Brook. Lots of Whites, a couple of Commas, a Peacock, a few Red Admirals and quite a lot of Gatekeepers on the Butterfly front was nice!! Some pictures below.

Couple of Pics of Mr White-eye from the garden, he is getting on a bit now, but still the boss

Female Beautiful Demoiselle

Male Beautiful Demoiselle

Dragonfly

View across the Weald

HPP Church

Wolstonbury Hill

Dragonfly eating a fly

Green Woodpecker

Great Spotted Woodpecker

Large White, most of em didn't stop flying long enough to get a pic!

What you looking at?!

Chiffchaff

Common Whitethroat

Trio of Blue Tits, there were four but couldn't get em all in!

Tatty Peacock

Loan Poppy

Sparrowhawk

Comma

A nice couple of hours!!! My PSSD (Post Shopping Stress Disorder) Banished!!

Saturday, 11 July 2026

Spotted at Pulborough!

I was wondering where to go today, a Night Heron at Southampton was tempting, but I've been hurt before by em, it's a long way and with the heat, standing around in a park all day was not an attractive proposition. Having seen some reports of Spotted Flycatcher, I decided an early morning jaunt to RSPB Pulborough Brooks was in order. I don't think I saw a Spot Fly at all last year so it was well overdue!

I arrived at 5.45 a sterling effort and headed down the Heathland Trail, no sight nor sound of any Flycatchers! Typical! Not much of anything but I did see a couple of White Storks from Hails Viewpoint!

Early morning Heath view

Distant White Stork!

Stock Dove saw quite a few, including a flock of 7 on the entrance track!

I gave up and headed up to the reserve, there is very little water on the Brooks at the moment so the hides were pretty bird less! The trails were much better, quite a few youngsters about notably Common Whitethroats and Green Woodpeckers, saw at least five young Green Woodpeckers around the reserve!

House Sparrow on the Visitor Center roof

Common Whitethroat

Blackbird

Common Whitethroat

Green Woodpecker, posed very well so there are a quite a few pics!

Young Stonechat

Blackbird

Common Whitethroat

Song Thrush

With the heat building plenty of insects about!

Reed Bunting

The Storks had moved around to the North Brooks, but were even further away!

Blackcap, saw a few and Chiffchaffs but always on the move

Silver-washed Fritillary I think! Though most orange Butterflies were Gatekeepers. Never seen so many Gatekeeper Butterflies must of seen 100s around the place!

These were miles away and I didn't take my scope, but pretty sure two Little Ringed Plover and a Common Sandpiper

Grey Heron

White Stork

House Sparrow

Back to the car park, I couldn't resist another shot st the Spot Flys, I literally had gone through the gate to the Heathland Trail when I heard them calling!! Took a bit of winkling out, but a bit of patience and eventually they were landing on some very nice sticky out branches!!