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The Kentish Plover twitch! Friday 27th August: Meeting up with John Hague at Cossington Meadows after a morning looking at the gulls at Shawell and seeing 3 Yellow-legged Gulls, we both hoping for some wader action or possibly a Redstart or Whinchat on the reserve. Scanning over the tern pool the only thing of note was a group of five Wigeons and six Shovelers, but not much else. Moving into the upper marsh section, we slowly scanned the marsh, when suddenly John shouted Spotted Crake , Fu*king Spotted Crake! Now as he said this I thought he was joking, but then realised that he wasn't!! After a couple of minutes of "heart in the mouth" situation the Crake showed again briefly as it ran along the shoreline, and then the celebrations began. We phoned out the news of the bird and then waited for the usual faces to appear.The Crake showed again briefly 10 minutes later but the bird wasn't playing ball. So after this the first birders started to appear, Jez Robson, Roge...

Over the last weekend I spent a couple of days at the British Birdfair and was great to meet and greet so many people around the fair. Just to name a few included David Lindo, Alan Davies and Ruth Millar, Tristan Reid,Tom McKinney, Mike Weedon, Dag and the Birdnet Team and Dave Cohen and Pete Asher (my mentors from my old YOC days). As usual with the Birdfair I spent a bit of money and bought myself a new head for my Manfrotto tripod. So now my tripod has got a Gitzo head on it!?! photo courtesy of the Drunkbirder aka John Hague!

Here is a few shots of the birds I co found and saw over the last couple of days! The events of weekend will appear shortly!?!

Following on from the Drunkbirder and the Leicester Llama I have changed the format and the design of the blog. What do people think of it and hope you like it? Also over the weekend I will be at the British Birdfair at Rutland Water, so come along and say hello to me and the Drunkbirder as we will be manning the LROS stand in marquee 2 on Saturday afternoon?

Talking to John Hague last week of what birds we still need for our Soar Valley year list as it reaches the magic target of 140, I said about Ruffs being a rare bird in the Soar Valley and would be lucky to see one! So after finishing work on Friday I nipped down to Cossington Meadows LRWT and promptly found a juvenile Ruff feeding around the Tern Pool!! I texted a few of the Soar Valley regulars of the sighting and then took a few record shots of the bird. So the moral of this story is maybe I should have wished for something rarer like a Semi-P or a Baird's Sandpiper as it's high time the Soar Valley had another good rarity?!

Over the last few days I checked out the Soar Valley for some wader action and Shawell GPs (A5 balancing pool) for the gulls! The sightings I have seen included a Juvenile Greenshank, 2 Common Sandpipers ,2 Green Sandpipers and 1 Snipe and a Spotted Flycatcher (year tick 134?) at Cossington Meadows. Other sightings in the Soar Valley area have included 2 Hobbies (Adult and Juvenile). At Shawell I noted that the Gull numbers are slowly increasing and have found at least three adult-types Yellow-legged Gulls yesterday loafing on the balancing lake.

As the orchid season is coming to a close with two species still possible (Autumn Ladies Tresses and Ghost Orchid!!),I will be revering back to type and back to a bit of birding?! Over the last week or so I have seen the twitchable Pied Flycatcher at Groby Pool, found a Caspian Gull at Shawell A5 pool and noted some good waders down the Soar Valley which included Greenshank , Dunlin and good numbers of Green Sandpipers .

Hi all, here is a few shots of the Violet Helleborines (Epipactis purpurata) I saw at the weekend. I also noted an interesting species in the wood which had variegated leaves!

After my trip to Southern Germany a few days later I nipped over to Lincolnshire and Cloud Wood LRWT to check out a few Epipactis (Helleborine) sites. Green-flowered Helleborine The first stop of the day was Whisby nature park near Lincoln for the Green-flowered Helleborines (Epipactis phyllanthes) and following the directions from Grahame Cadwood, one of the wardens at Whisby I was soon photographing a new orchid species for me, GF Hells OMFL!! In the same area were also good numbers of Broad-leaved Helleborines (Epipactis helleborine) and of particular note the variety Var.viridiflora .                                                         Var.viridiflora at Whisby  The next stop of the day was Messingham Quarry LWT for one of the few inland sites in the country for Dune Helleborine (Epipactis dunensis). With directions from Gr...