Morning on the Patch

 Well after the excitement of my last two outings I thought I better calm things down and have a walk round the Patch. Arrived at the parking spot, on the Old London Road, at 10 mins  after 6am, Little bit of mist around, with a Fox across the road the first siting of note!

Misty start, pretty atmospheric if I say so myself!!

Fox in the mist

I headed along Cutler's Brook, more water in it than I was expecting to be honest, although still low, not much activity here, turned left at the crossroads and headed up the track, still pretty quiet, the derelict Barn at the top of the hill still refuses to have a Little Owl in it, but the Sun coming through the window looked nice!

Okish Sunrise

Sun through the window!

I headed down the hill opposite the Barn, the area at the bottom on my last visit  was full of birds hopes were high. I spotted a white blob on the bank, sitting in the brambles, a Whinchat!! it was rather buried and soon flew along the bank toward the bottom of the hill where it showed alright, been an excellent weekend for Whinchats and nice to get a local one!!

I'm fairly pleased with this shot, taken on manual focus not bad with my eyesight😊

Showed better at the bottom of the hill, they are cracking little birds!

I reached the bottom, was a bit of activity, notably, a small flock of yellowhammers, including a couple of Juveniles. a few Blue and Great Tits, a Robin and a few Linnets and Goldfinches although no where near the amount on my last visit.

Yellowhammer

Blue Tits

Yellowhammer

Robin

Yellowhammer and Whinchat

Blue Tit, Yellowhammer and Whinchat

Couple of Yellowhammers

Yellowhammer

Yellowhammer

Linnet

I headed through the Vineyard, devoid of birds, though did hear a Green Woodpecker, the view from the top is good though and the Grassland here had Swallows zipping about it!

HPP Church

Swallow over the grass

Headed up and around Church Lane, again very quiet, the patch itself was very quiet as well, with a couple of Whitethroats and a Green Woodpecker on offer! 

So few birds that I got arty with the Spider Webs of which there were many!

Green Woodpecker, Come into the light I said, did it?

Nope flew up to the highest tree and made funny noises at me for 5 minutes!

Skulky Common Whitethroat

Dunnock, not many of these about though I did see about 8 Wrens none of which would pose

I walked down to the Church, a bird on the fence next to the Church turned out to be a Spotted Flycatcher, bit tricky to get pics of but I did another manual focus special!

Spotted Flycatcher

This gave me a bit of a moral dilemma, should I walk away at this point happy with the pic I got or walk through the churchyard risking damnation and hellfire, to get a better shot, although there is a footpath through the middle of it. In these situations I usually ask myself "what would Margie say?" I figured she'd say "go for it"😀 ( she definitely wouldn't say "go for it", she rarely says "go for it" on any of my hairbrained schemes, such as minor incidences of trespass to get a better view or leaning over cliffs to get a slightly better shot of a Gannet!) So very careful I picked my way through the graves, don't think I stood on any, although John, serf of this Parish, may, back in 1853 have given a little shudder and said to his his mate "ooh someone just walked over my grave"  in which case apologies. That said in 200 years time if a handsome, young birder wishes to walk over my grave to get an average shot of a not very rare bird I won't object, although as I'm probably going to be cremated or left out for Vultures  and there may not be many birds left in 200 years time, it may be a moot point!! Anyway I got a few pics and that's the main thing!!!😊😂

Spotted Flycatcher

I headed back through the glades, again very quiet, although lots of spiders webs and I discovered my Boots are no longer waterproof😏 a few Blackcaps in the hedge wouldn't pose, the Starling flock on the first field seems to be building up again and there were 3 Roe Deer in the distance, not doing much!

Quite pleased with this one double web!

They weren't all empty!

Starlings and friend

Roe Deer

Think he may have been in "the mood" not sure it's reciprocated as yet!

That was about it, disappointed not to run into a large Tit flock, but a couple of moments of quality in an otherwise slow couple of hours!

Downland Wander

 

Got up a bit late today, so it wasn't until 10 o'clock that Margie and I found ourselves at the small car park at the southern end of  the Bostal Road, kitting up for a walk east over the Downs. Weather was nice, sunny with a bit of breeze but I risked leaving the sweatshirt off!!

Hunk Alert 😁Yes I know I should have put a warning on before posting this pic sorry to any ladies who banged their head with all the swooning!! Also for anyone who saw me yesterday I have 2 of these t-shirts exactly the same, note the perfect camouflage against the blue sky!!

First bird, from the car was a Raptor, the first of 2 that would try to trick me, I had all but convinced myself it was a Honey Buzzard when I realised it was just a Common striking plumage though for sure!!

Common Buzzard

After a bit of head scratching we crossed the road headed down the path, it was very quiet, in the distance I picked out a small bird on a bush, which I felt was a Whinchat, but by the time we got there it had been flushed by mountain bikers, though pics proved me right, another fairly impressive long distance ID shout if I say so myself! Which I do!!😁

Whinchat, couple of whitethroats and a Willow Warbler were also in the bush but couldn't get any pics!

We turned right at the 1st junction, were some cows in the field, but no Yellow wags with em, however all was not lost as along the fence line were a couple of Stonechats and at least 3 Whinchats, this fence line is a bit overgrown and the Whinchats managed to hide behind any bit of grass or random bit of bramble until one took pity on me, possibly embarrassed by all the swearing, flying a short distance into the field and posing on an isolated seed head, long enough that even I could get a couple of decent pics!

Margie felt this one was the cutest!

I took about 100 pics of this bird on the fence, this was the only one where the bird was in focus and not the blade of grass!!

"This alright for you", seems slightly angry!!

There was a bit of a breeze, so to maintain balance the bird had to throw some moves!

Before you start there is no such thing as too many pics of a Whinchat, you're lucky I was so restrained!😲

Meanwhile Margie was busy taking pictures of flowers, where Bees had been moments before😂

Some nice pics from her there, she also spent rather to much time lining this shot up!! 

Yes it looks like a circle, whoop😏! 

And this one!!

Yes it looks like the pylons are marching out to sea to the windfarm!!

Blooming artistic types, what's wrong wih pictures of birds 😁She also managed some nice shots of the view!

Thankfully I found 4 Wheatears at this point, although a bit distant and intent on hiding in the grass I managed a couple of pics!

Wheatear

Wheatear

Another distant Whinchat

The path we were on, ran around, halfway up a hill, the fields below us held the Wheatear, the fields above was a pasture of short grass with not much occurring, glancing up I saw a small Raptor "harrying" across the field, the light was terrible but I had just about convinced myself it was a Monty's with a few doubts, IE couldn't see a white rump, though not that surprising considering the angle we was at, when it went full power mode and turned into an obvious though large Sparrowhawk!! Bloody birds, don't think in all my years birding I have ever seen a Sprawk flying like this one was to start with!!

Sparrowhawk, "harrying" !

Then full power mode

Just shows it is easy to get confused with bird ID especially in dodgy light, birds in unfamiliar habitat, looking through a view finder instead of Bins, although I wasn't the one who turned a cyclist into a stork!!!!😂

We turned left and headed up the hill Margie found some interesting stuff, but birdwise was quiet, couple of Willow Warblers, a Whitethroat and a Wheatear, none of which posed for pics, although a Kestrel showed reasonable at the top, the path loops around and we headed back along the escarpment.

Kestrel

Shoreham Power station and Lancing College I think!

No clue what this is but Margie liked it!

View of the Sea by Margie

The escarpment was annoying with 3 Kestrels hunting it, me thinking I'm gonna get eye level shots of hunting Kestrels, Kestrels deciding to hunt everywhere else except opposite me, grrrr!!😡 Couple of posy Wheatears on the fence did make up for it though!!!

For once the autofocus chose the bird and not the blade of grass, Hurrah!!

Completing the loop back to the car was uneventful apart from a Bi-plane flying over and an old guy shouting at a mountain biker!! Which is always fun and fully justified as he nearly ran him over!! Some of them are mental and others very considerate and nice, takes all-sorts!

Bi-plane

All around a very nice walk, not many local birds about, a few Goldfinch and a small flock of Linnets but no Skylarks or Corn Buntings which we usually see here, possibly the time of day didn't help and it's a big area with quite a bit of set aside, distant from the paths so hopefully they were all in there! Like yesterday there were loads of Swallows about over the fields, a sure sign of Autumn on the way!

On the way home we stopped at the Small Dole Fox, for lunch, luckily they had a table and a very tasty Ham, Eggs and Chips was enjoyed and I highly recommend the delicious homemade Tropical Fruit Trifle made with Peach Snaps it was very tasty and very large!!!!