Having stayed overnight on Friday (07/09) with some of Em's family near Oxford, I gave Farmoor a visit first thing Saturday morning.
It was gloomy and drizzly and so promised much! A walk along the causeway and the full perimeter of F2 produced 100s of House Martins, enticing a couple of hunting Hobby. The juvenile Black Tern that had been about for a few days, was right out on a buoy in the middle of F2. Common Sand & Dunlin were seen briefly, while a close in Red Crested Pochard was nice.
More interest came with a very approachable juvenile Great Black Backed Gull. It was rung, (JJ808) and appears to be from a scheme in southern Norway. I've e-mailed them and await a response.
The highlight though was a beaut of a classic juvenile Caspian Gull, that I initially ID'ed as a possible from the causeway, sat out on a buoy, but confirmed once closer, towards the southern end of F2 (phone-scoped pics below). It showed well together with several Yellow-Legged Gulls of varying ages.
Later on, having gone home and sorted out a few things, I decided to pop out again for a few hours, for bit of a tour of South Northants sites. I started at Daventry Country Park where there were lots of birds about. Scoping from the dam brought a Garganey, 7 Green Sand, 1 Pintail, 3 YLG and a Snipe, together with lots of Teal, Shoveler, Gadwall and gulls.
Nearby Borough Hill was relatively birdless, however 4 Whinchat close to the BBC compound, were cool!
On the way home, a couple of Yellow-Legged Gulls were the only things of note at Bodington Res, while there were at least 2 more amongst a large numbers of gulls following the plough close to Brackley.
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