South Northants round-up

After work (Thursday 03/04) I went over to Daventry Reservoir with the possibility o seeing the Snow Bunting that had been present there for much of the day. Sadly it had vanished by the time I arrived in the mid-evening gloom. Small consolations came in the form of a relatively early Common Tern, c.30 Sand Martins, a stunning looking leucistic Black Headed Gull (below) and a female Goosander.

Next up was an early morning visit to Borough Hill (Saturday 05/04). The weather was grey and actually pretty dam cold. The birds were thin on the ground with best being my first Wheatear of the year (a female), 2 singing Willow Warbler (also first of the year) and a smattering of singing Chiffchaff and Blackcap.

Onto to nearby Daventry Reservoir and I soon had 3 Common Scoter (2 males, 1 female) in view out on the water. They had already been present or the previous 2 days or so. Also here were my first Swallow of the year, 2 Sand Martin, 1 Common Tern and singing Willow Warbler and Blackcap.

A visit to Boddington Reservoir mustered only singing Willow Warbler and Bucknell Wood produced a very close encounter with a Fox, as well as the continuing presence of both Redpoll & Siskin.

After work on Tuesday (08/04) I went over to Boddington Reservoir again and while there was nothing too flashy about, I did get great views of a Little Owl (below) as well as a Swallow.

To complete the round-up, the next day saw a report of a Sandwich Tern at Boddington (ahh why wasn't it there the previous evening!). Still during my lunch break I shot of over to see it. Thankfully I was in luck with a very dapper, yet rather distant adult Sandwich Tern sat on one of the buoys off the sailing club (very poor photo below). This was a long awaited county tick for me with them being notoriously tricky to catch up with. It flew around a bit and caught at least 3 fish in the short time I was there before I had to shoot off back to work. Mission accomplished!