Sightings

Main sighting: Red Kite

Pale undersided Red Kite seen quartering a field just cut for hay next to the M4 at this postcode. Also seen above my house same postcode on Easter Sunday and a fortnight previously (NP26 3BX) This was the first time I had seen a Red Kite in this location

Main sighting: Tawny Owl

An unseasonal duet at last light in cool, breezy conditions. Half an hour’s worth of hooting, kewick and trilling. Curious!

Main sighting: Red Kite

Sorry, got the date wrong, it was today of course not tomorrow!

Main sighting: Common Sandpiper 8

Med gull Ad – 2 Common gull

Main sighting: Hen Harrier

Anyone interested in Hen Harrier Day, Sunday 11th August. We’re going !!! Please contact Nick and Gill Saunders gillnick263@gmail.com

Main sighting: Canada Geese

At 1 pm flock of 70 Canada Geese on the inner marsh in brisk SW winds. A Whimbrel, 2 Cormorants, 5 Martins west, one Shelduck family with 5 medium sized juvs, a second with 2 fully grown juvs.

Main sighting: Gulls

Over 200 mixed flock over Malpas at 17.30 with rising queen ants .Lbb hg bhg.

Main sighting: Swifts

70 plus swift over chepstow garden centre at 10 am

Main sighting: Great White Egret

A GWE flew in from the Uskmouth direction over Monk’s Lagoon, Common Sandpiper 1 Knot 6 BP LRP 8 2 ads 6 juvs Black-tailed Godwit 181 Redshank 141 Dunlin 84 Sand Martin 300 Yellow Wagtail 1 Redstart 1 juv. Also: Emerald Damselfly Black-tailed Skimmer Painted Lady Large White Gatekeeper Meadow Brown

Main sighting: Med gull 2

Whimbrel 2

Main sighting: Passerines

Dawn – mid morning visit: 3 herons, 1 whimbrel over the lagoons (later re-located on the foreshore), 4 cormorants, 9 curlew (12 more on the mudflats, guessing they are slowly returning from the upland breeding sites)?, 5 lt egrets, 116 redshanks, 41 dunlin, 1 reed warbler singing, 5 skylarks, 56 oystercatchers on 2nd lagoon, 231 black-tailed godwits (a number in breeding plumage), only 8 of the 11 recently seen knot (4 in breeding plumage), 36 coot, 8 gadwall, 33 lapwing, 1 sedge warbler, 1 chiffchaff (contact call only), continual small groups of swallows (70 in highest count) with 91 sand martins mixed in, 6 swifts overhead high up, pair of tufted ducks, kingfisher on the edge of the reeds from the snipe platform. Along the hedgerow leading to the seawall was a family group of common whitethroats and a juvenile female redstart. Mudflats: 2 gt b b gulls, 1 common sandpiper on the rocks, the whimbrel again, flossy the glossy far out on the mud, shelduck with 9 young a common porpoise breaching. Back around the lagoons was a pair of wigeon,a juv and an adult female yellow wagtails (pictures on my twitter site later), 1 stock dove and the male marsh through. Numerous meadow browns on the wing and 2 small heath butterflies in the brambles by the entrance of hide 1.

Main sighting: Knots

Evening visit -11 x Knots on foreshore, Curlews making more of an apperance on lagoons. Big flock of Black Headed Gulls 1 x Med Gull (very clean) 1 x Med Gull (Scruffy). Monks and Becs – Scattering of Dunlins with Little/Ringed Plovers and Juvenile birds. Black Tailed Godwits on foreshaw and a few around the lagoons. Big flock of Redshanks on Priors. Great Spotted Woodpecker Juvenile often seem on the perimeter posts near seawall. Water levels now very low on Monks and Becs. Priors is like a green lagoon lots of algae