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Local weather

Update

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14th Aug

There was a decent little arrival of migrants today in murky but very warm and muggy conditions. The highlights were a Wood Warbler in one of the private gardens along with ten Pied Flycatchers whilst commoner migrants included 35 Willow Warblers, a Spotted Flycatcher, two Whinchats and a Redstart. A Corn Bunting in the Desert was also an unusual record and a Green Sandpiper also flew over.
 

Wood Warbler Phylloscopus sibilatrix   Dungeness   14th August 2020
There was also a bit of movement offshore, mainly in the afternoon, with 4.5 hours of watching producing 828 Common Terns, nine Black Terns, four Little Terns and five Arctic Skuas. Four juvenile Yellow-legged Gulls were also seen.

 At least 12 Porpoise and two Grey Seals were feeding offshore and in the early hours of the morning a Common Pipistrelle bat made a couple of passes around the Observatory.

 It was another interesting night in the moth traps with four Golden Twin-spots and a Palpita vitrealis of note.

 An evening visit to survey the rarer crickets of the area produced four Sickle-bearing Bush-crickets, another excellent chorus from the Tree Crickets which certainly seem to be increasing their numbers and range and at least 30 Ectobius montanus.
Sickle-bearing Bush-cricket Phanoptera falcata   Dungeness   14t August 2020

Tree Cricket Oecanthus pellucens   Dungeness   14th August 2020
Elsewhere, there was a clear insect highlight in the form of an Antlion Eurolean nostras which came to Barry Banson's mothtrap at Greatstone. There are a handful of previous records of this species.
Eurolean nostras   Greatstone    14th August 2020.


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