One of those horribly hot calm days with blue skies and blinding sunshine.
1 hours sky watch on Soil Hill late afternoon was hard work with scorching sun causing a heat haze and clouds of biting midges.
Despite the drawbacks, skies were lively with Mipits piling through >W in groups of up to 12 whilst Swallows headed >S in good numbers, some very high whilst others were skimming the grass.
House Martins were in with the Swallows also >S whilst a distant Buzzard over Baildon area headed >S also.
Looking across at Oxenhope reservoir there is very little shoreline with most of the gulls either on the NW banking or on the water. I could see that at last the embankment has been cut which should attract some passerines. We once had 78 Twite drop in there one autumn.
Vis Mig
1 Buzzard sp...........................>S
c 300 Swallow.......................>S
38 House Martin...................>S
c 150 Meadow Pipit.............>W
c30 Meadow Pipit ..............blogging
3 Skylark............................blogging or overwintering.
20 + Goldfinch....................locals
Ogden, mid evening
Again poor conditions , hot and sticky with glaring sun on the water putting everything into silhouette.
The usual 3 Cormorants were present and a small number of gulls on the shoreline whilst 2 Teal were dead centre of the water, I had a count of 16 on 10/09/2015.
Just 1 Little Grebe at the north end with 4 Goldcrest in passerine alley but no time to search for the Tit flock.
Watch for those Pink Footed Geese moving, Ive had them on the 18/9 in previous years although they dont really kick off until October.
BS