Avez-Vous un Cuppa?

Here is some footage of one of the Spotted Crakes at Birstall Meadows last week via my mate John Hague: http://thedrunkbirder.wordpress.com/2012/08/21/spotted-a-crake/ Also here is a couple of rubbish digishots of the bird by me!

Well over the last week or so on the local patch it has been quite interesting on the birding front and also here is an update on the interesting Helleborine in NW Leicestershire from my mate Sean Cole.  At least two or maybe three  Spotted Crakes have been at Birstall Meadows (25/8/12). There has been two Whinchats and a Redstart (female/Juv) at Cossington Meadows for most of last week.  And Possible the bird of last week was a brief female-type Pied Flycatcher at Watermead CP North on Sunday 19th. Nearby on Wanlip Meadows scrape on the same day was a Spotted Redshank and five Ruffs! Also here is some comments of the Interesting Helleborines from my mate Sean: My observations of the current state of Helleborines there is as follows: 1. There are mostly completely standard, well-within morphological range plants there, whether they are in deep shade, woodland edge, or in the slightly more open area...

Here is a few more photos of the Broad-leaved Helleborines in NW Leicestershire. As you can see an interesting range of plants!

Following on from an excellent id section in Martin Garner's Birding Frontiers blog about Caspian Gulls. I decided to revisit some photos I took last year of the Caspian-type gulls at Watermead CP South and Albert Village Lake. I am now happy with the intial ID of these birds and maybe I should be more confident on my own convinctions! Here is a few shots of the birds I have been talking about: