Saturday 16th October 2010

Well its mid October, the month we all look forward to each year for the rarity fest, and so far this month, I've not left Staffordshire yet. Today started off as per usual at Westport. CJW joined us today and it was not that bad a visit with 60+ Fieldfare flying over plus the first returning Goldeneye. Then we joined fellow Clayhead PJ up at one of our favourite sites, Berryhill. Armed with our barbed wire cutters, electric fence disablers plus spades in case we needed to dig a tunnel, we went in search of the BLACK REDSTART. Our good friend, Russell B was on site and had already seen it. We followed his directions, and for the first ten minutes of our visit, we didn't have to negotiate a single barbed wired fence. Unfortunately, there was no further sign of the BLACK REDSTART despite a thorough search and the obligatory fence scaling session to find our way out of the maze that is Berryhill.

While we were dipping at Berryhill, we joked that I would have nothing to report and no photo's for my blog again. I laughed and said that I still had two more sites in Staffordshire to visit, and I would not have to resort to posting pictures from the past just to fill my blog up.

So its back to October 17th 2003 and an excellent few days in the Scillies. We had already ticked the Pied Wheatear on St Mary's on our arrival the day before, and we were very fortunate that on the morning of the 17th, the GREY-CHEEKED THRUSH was refound on Tresco. Thats where we headed, and the bird gave us the real run around before finally, late in the afternoon giving itself up for all to see. Pictures below.







But back to today. At BGP's I managed to see a Marsh Tit, 42 Golden Plover, four Ruff, three Green Sands and a Redshank. I also met another birder there today. This is my 25th visit to BGP this year, and so far I've seen three birders there - Messrs Powell, Scattergood and a nice young couple out the pouring rain one time. Today I met an elderly gentleman, who stopped and had a chat and introduced himself. It was none other than DIMW himself!

And finally, this is for you Chris