Thursday...A Beautiful Morning at The Fleet and Portland (part 2)

Previously, on Thursday...A Beautiful Morning at The Fleet and Portland..... PB's sis had the big lens for a close up Kestrel encounter, and didn't even fire a shot off Rolling eyes

We decided to head on to Portland itself, and have a mooch about, Pipits, Wheatears and apparently 3 different Wrynecks were about, also a Hobby for the last couple of days, so we were hopeful of a nice wander.

I've never known no wind at the Bill before, but that was what we had, glorious blue skies, sunshine and no wind...and I had my lens back!!

First up Maggie

There were Swallows everywhere flitting about feeding up, I reckon I took about 100 shots if not more, and probably 90 of them were dark blobs or just blue sky lol

There were a good number of insects about, including stripy bees and not stripy bees

And after lamenting the lack of Speckled Woods this year, I saw a few Smiley although the first was quite tatty

We headed up to where the latest reports of Wryneck sightings was (spotting a gaggle of people with scopes and cameras all pointing in the same general direction was a good clue as to where to go!) and speaking to a chap there, the Wryneck had been there earlier, but not been seen in a while. We decided to pause a while and see what pootled along, and there were a good few Whitethroat

And still people peered into the brambles for the Wryneck

A jewellery laden Robin

Still no signs of the elusive Wryneck

Overhead (now I know size is notoriously difficult to judge, but this appeared much larger than a Kestrel.... and apparently there were 3 Honey Buzzards over Portland yesterday....is this one?)

I turned back to the impenetrable brambles, still no Wryneck

An almost transparent Blue caught my eye

No Wryneck, but more Whitethroat

Another Magpies decided to show off its glorious silhouette

"What's that?" Sis asked, looking in a totally different direction to everyone else, "What's what?" ask I, "That on the Bramble that sort of does that" she made a sweeping gesture with her arm.. "Ohhh... that's it!!"

And a sudden shuffling of people behind us and "Where" "I see it" and  "Wow" comments signalled our time to move on... redemption achieved lol

A nicer looking Speckled Wood came to land in front of us

Now, it wasn't until I read yesterdays Portland sightings that I wondered if this next shot might be an Ortolan Bunting.... previously I had no idea, as the reddish back confused me.... and I won't be at all surprised if it's something else

Another Speckled Wood gazed lovingly at us (v, strange eyes!!)

One of the many Wheatear caught itself some brunch 

I must be honest, I thought at first this was another Wheatear, but no.... a  Son-Istle Thrush

And finally a triple of Wheatear, possibly the handsomest of migrants

And then we headed to Mum and Dads for a spot of lunch. How very civilised!!

A memorable day with potentially three new birds for me, Wryneck, Honey Buzzard and the Bunting, fabulous weather and fun company.

Hope you enjoyed, as always corrections and ID's welcome please.

Stay Safe All