Well, it's been quite exciting at Old Moor today as you can no doubt gather from my title.
The red necked phalarope is new in this evening and was picked up by Sid Renouf who was in the Wader Scrape hide and it's a male. Here's the link to the RSPB webpage about this bird for a bit more info. As far as I know it's still there and there is yet time to go and find it before the gates shut at 8pm.
The glossy ibis was still at Old Moor today and it's been on the field pools and at Wath Ings. Early on it was best seen from the drive into Old Moor. Visitors have seen it from both the Field Pool East and the Field Pool West hides today as well as from the hide at Wath Ings where it has been seen on the spit. It's a smallish bird, maybe smaller than you might think from looking at the photos. Fingers crossed that both of these birds are still with us tomorrow.
Bittern news...the nests are continuing to progress as expected and info from the team in the monitoring hide are helping to confirm this progress. There have been numerous flights from female bitterns today and many of them could have been, and probably were, viewed from our hides and from the Bittern Bus Stop. We've had flights to Wath Ings, the field pools, the wildlife ponds and the reedbeds by the path which is closed. At one point, watchers saw 2 bitterns fly out of the channel in front of the reedbed screen.
I had a bit of a giddy moment as I was watching dingy skipper butterflies near the leap frogs. I looked up as there was a commotion happening with the gulls, and saw a bittern flying over my head! I had the thought that a photo of it using my macro lens would be pretty cool but sadly I was a bit too slow. Great sighting though!
Raptors seen today are - hobby, male kestrel, a cc marsh harrier and 2 buzzards.
Here are a couple of photos of the sightings book from today.
There were lots of dingy skipper butterflies around today, especially around the ponds. Here's a little video of one of them.
One of my favourite sightings today was of a beautiful holly blue butterfly. It was near the Wader Scrape hide which is not normally where I am expecting to see them. It looked as though it was ovipositing (laying eggs) but I might be wrong.
For sightings from our satellite sites please look at the Twitter feed of @BarnsleyBSG.
Have a lovely Saturday evening :)