The dish delivers

Patching at the 'soap-dish', or Grimsbury Reservoir, Banbury is always pretty hard work, particularly this year with seemingly endless periods of bugger all! However, it's convenient and very occasionally something half decent turns up!

The last week/10 days has seen far happier times, with a handful of decent birds. The pinnacle was an exciting find on the morning of Tuesday 22/08, with a group of 4 Common Scoters appearing out of the early morning mist. These were my 131st species for the patch and a bird I have always hoped to find here. So, understandably, I was pretty chuffed!

Monday (21/08) also proved to be a decent day with me finally connecting with my first Grimbo Redstart of the year, as well as an impressive SEVEN Wheatear. There was a real sense of things 'on the move' with several Yellow Wags heading south and a steady trickle of Swifts through too.

Gulls have been in relative short supply so far this July/August compared to the previous couple of years. But on Friday (18/08), it was good to see a smart juvenile Med Gull, pretty much the only gull on the reservoir during it's brief half hour stay, before circling off high to the NE.

Hopefully, these are all the start of a bit more happening at the patch over the coming few weeks!