I had an early morning walk today and heard several Roesel's bush crickets singing from areas of tussocky false oat grass on Phase 2 of the reedbed. The song of the Roesel's bush cricket is a continuous high pitched buzz (like a higher pitched grasshopper warbler song) emitted by the males. They are not actually singing - the sound is produced by rubbing together the two modified front wings and is called stridulation. I managed to stalk one male down in the base of a grass clump, diagnostic with his broad creamy 'U'-shaped boarder to his pronotum (the part of the body behind the head). The one I saw was short-winged, but there is a longer-winged varient that is apparently commoner in warm summers (so should be some about!). Roesel's bush crickets have been expanding their range northwards and westwards in England, and I saw one at Girton Gravel Pits, to the north of Langford Lowfields, a couple of years ago so not surprising it is present on the reserve, but still a pleasure to hear and see. I saw my first one on Havergate Island in Suffolk in the 1990s.
I'm not a big list keeper but I thought I'd see how many different birds I could see this morning. The total was 61 species - excellent to know there is so much biodiversity near Newark. Highlights were the pair of marsh harriers, a greenshank flew over calling (an early sign of autumn), three green sandpipers, a little ringed plover, several yellow wagtails including two juveniles, a reeling grasshopper warbler, a juvenile tree sparrow and a lesser whitethroat.