Thursday 25th August 2011 - Shenstone and Grimley/Holt

I arrived at the patch this morning at around 10am and decided to check out the paddocks/fence posts at Stanklyn Lane first.  For once the bloke who uses the first 2 paddocks wasn't in there having a furtle with his horses and it showed.  What is usually a bird less paddock held 2 Yellow Wagtails (1 adult & 1 imm.), 10 Pied Wagtail, 6 Linnet, 5 Mistle Thrush and 20 Starling.  After about 20 minutes the Wagtails flew off on mass heading SW, the rest of Stanklyn Lane was relatively bird less.

I then headed up to Heath Lane where a flock of 30+ Linnet were wheeling about at the rear of the large stubble field.  Two more Linnets and rather downy juvenile Greenfinch were on the hedgerow at the model aircraft field.  A light-phase Common Buzzard went over heading East.

I then headed over to witch Lane where the only birds of note were 2 Common Buzzard and 6 Stock Dove.

The number of butterfly species being recorded around the patch is decreasing as the season draws on with  only Speckled Wood and Small White putting in an appearance today.

Speckled Wood

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From Shenstone I headed 10 miles or so down the road to Grimley.  I dropped in to check Sling Pool at Holt first, as there had been a Greenshank present there the previous day.  Greenshanks are not an uncommon passage wader in Worcestershire but I always feel that they are a smart looking bird that is a joy to watch.  On arriving at Sling Pool I picked up the Greenshank immediately, 2 Green Sandpipers were also present.  I noticed that along the near edge of the field there was a sandy mound (large areas of North Worcestershire is on sandstone and it tends to have very sandy).  On scanning the mound I picked up a Wheatear and seconds later an imm. Common Redstart on the adjacent fence/hedge.  A family of Chiffchaff were flitting about nearby.  What a good day this was becoming.

I then headed to the Camp Lane pits where I had 4 Yellow Wagtail at the North End.  A Greenshank and a Common Sandpiper were along the edge of the main pit.  A Common Tern and small numbers of Sand Martin were through.

Along the causeway were 2 Migrant Hawkers and a Brown Hawker dragonfly.

Northern Wheatear

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Greenshank with Teal

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Late afternoon 2 Wheatear were present at Stanklyn Lane paddocks (JC)