.

Overnight rain left the vegetation dripping wet this morning, which in turn soaked me from the knees down, but despite being dull and overcast, at least it was still and quite warm out.

I continued my quest to find new species for the months list, plus I was keeping an eye out for any newly fledged young that haven't yet been recorded this year, I failed on the latter, although I was really pleased to see 3 young KESTRELS in their nest box at the Greenhouse Grounds, looks like they've a while before they fledge yet, fingers crossed for them  :-)

As for new species for the month, I thought the Long Tailed Tit and Mistle Thrush were the most likely candidates, but neither were found, instead I added SPOTTED FLYCATCHER (50) when the one I found last week at the western end of Ashes lane was relocated, nice species to bring up the months 50th  :-)

Also added for the July list was a cracking male HOBBY (51) that flew low over the lakes as I was watching the COOT family there, this was the second of four raptor species seen today, as two BUZZARDS were watched as they circled low over the Maize crop in the Pub Field, and a SPARROWHAWK sped through the Small Holding towards my garden feeders  :-(

One more species was found to add to the months list this morning, that was BLACK HEADED GULL (52), 3 birds flew over Migrant Alley during a 30 minute sky watch, in which little else was seen crossing the sky, just GREY HERON, LESSER BLACK BACKED GULL and a SKYLARK, I did note lots of SWIFTS about though, which could be the offspring of local breeders.

Other noteworthy species seen today were ; a LITTLE OWL at the Ashes Lane field, at least 2 family parties of BULLFINCH in the Scrubby Woods, where TREECREEPER, COAL TIT, GOLDREST and NUTHATCH were seen.

So 3 days into July, and the months list reaches 52, still 6 species behind the lowest July total recorded back in 2004, and 17 behind the highest total achieved in 2007, now that will take some beating!

Photo's today come from my ever trusty garden, taken over the past few days, it was just too dull out on my patch this morning - apparently we're in for some warm, sunny weather this weekend - can it be true!

Ive been back in my bathroom taking Goldcrest photo's from the window again  :-)

Little depth of field in these photo's due to me being so close, but I like the eye in this shot

Goldcrest

My garden is being swamped with young birds at the moment, this is a young GOLDFINCH

Young BLUE TIT

Male CHAFFINCH

Female Chaffinch

PS: I attended the Parish Council meeting last night, where a unanimous decision was taken to reject the planning application for the Hadlow college 'Free School' which would be built the on the sheep pasture at Migrant Alley ( a disaster!) This is the first small step in the right direction to stopping this pointless development  :-)