Up with the proverbial lark this morning to walk my patch of Radipole for a breeding waterfowl survey and very nice it was too. As with our previous survey swifts were present in great abundance slicing through the morning blue and giving the midges a fearful pasting. I met a visiting birder from Lincolnshire who had yet to see a swift this year on his native patch but now he can rectify this omission from his year list courtesy of the many hundreds gliding just over our heads on Radipole.
There were fewer broods on the water than one might expect in mid-June which may possibly be a knock-on from the deep winter and late spring. A few cygnets dutifully trailing their proud parents and mallards of differing age classes, sticking tight to the reeds to avoid the gulls wheeling overhead. The highlight for me was a brand new brood of eight gadwall (gadlings?!) bumbling about by the concrete bridge with mum, as a shoal of dace picked off passing morsels on the surface and the odd thick-lipped grey mullet ghosted beneath – always worth keeping an eye out here if you’re of a fishy disposition or, if you prefer, a piscatorial bent.
Lodmoor turned up more of the same plus the odd brood of pochard, shelduck, great crested grebe and a single brood of marble-sized little grebes riding piggyback on mum. Added to this the first of our oystercatcher pair still have two chicks which appear to have doubled in size over the past week, a second pair remain on eggs and a third pair have recently taken up residence. No fewer than 79 common terns were sitting on the island and the first hatchings should commence soon – so a veritable baby bird fest is in the offing!