Shenstone Birder: Friday 8th June 2012

Today was yet another day where the weather was absolutely pants and very uninspiring! I had no birding in mind so I decided to pop and see Tony for a natter and a mug of tea.

On pulling up at Tonys I heard a familiar sound, it was the unmistakable harsh screeching call of a Common Tern. I looked across and flying over Captains Pool was the tern with a small fish in its bill. This is a patch year tick for me so it was already proving to be a worthwhile visit. Also hawking low over the pool were 4 Swallows and 3 House Martins.

TS has been seeing 1 to 2 Common Terns fishing periodically since Tuesday. This tends to be a regular occurrence most summers and leads me to think that, although they don't breed on Captains Pool, they are most likely breeding nesting on one of the nearby pools. Looking at the direction that this bird flies off it is quite possible that they are nesting on one of the pools near Dunclent. A bit of investigation required me thinks!

Unfortunately I haven't got any photo's of the patch Terns but I have attached an archive photo (taken elsewhere) to illustrate what stunning birds they are.

Common Tern

Click on image to enlarge

6 comments:

Anonymous9 June 2012 at 02:16
Nice pic of the Tern, Jason.
ShySongbird9 June 2012 at 05:40
Lovely archive photo Jason, they are very handsome birds!

Re. the name change I actually like all of them including the original but as you are obviously thinking of a change I have voted for 'The Shenstone Naturalist' At the end of the vote you must go with your own choice though or you won't feel comfortable. You may not know but I changed the name of my blog a few weeks ago so great minds think alike as they say :-)
Warren Baker9 June 2012 at 09:08
Common Terns are less than annual here Jase, always a good species to get on the patch year list, not had one here yet though :-(
Omi9 June 2012 at 15:09
Nice piccy :) Investigation is always fun.
Linda9 June 2012 at 17:41
Beautiful photo of a lovely bird. Greetings from Monteal, Canada. Thank you for sharing.
Jason K10 June 2012 at 02:04
Dean - Cheers mate. I love watching Terns...they are so elegant and agile

Jan - They are indeed lovely looking birds.

Warren - There hadn't been a sniff of one until this week Warren. You never know you may get one on Autumn passage

Omi - Thank you...I toytally agree, there is nowt wrong ith a bit of detective work

Linda - Many thanks. You too have some beautiful wildlife in that part of the world