RSPB Otmoor :: 26 May 2019

It was due to drizzle thought e late morning / early afternoon so I set off after breakfast to see if I could eventually catch up with a turtle dove at RSPB Otmoor. Willow and sedge warblers as I headed to the bridleway and the cattle pens. Already I could hear cuckoos to my left. I reached the cattle pens to find a couple of joggers both dressed in luminous pink facing Greenaways, with two dogs off their leads. As I approached they asked whether I knew the species of the bird ahead of them. Having only just arrived I located the bird and found it was my long awaited turtle dove - hoorah! I lent them my bins and they were excited to know they had seen it. Soon they were off running again.

Added more sedge warbler along the bridleway, and then reed warbler too. I was distracted by the incessant calling of cuckoo along the hedgerow - great views but almost all were in flight, and out of range before I had my camera on them. I managed to take my eyes off the hedgerow long enough to see a weasel bound across the path and into the reed bed to my right.

Marsh harrier, redshank, snipe and various duck species all at the first screen. Soon drops of rain started to fall and I turned to make my way back to the car park. Before I reached the kissing gate leading to the bridleway, I heard what promised to be the reeling of a grasshopper warbler. Unfortunately it stopped and I wasn't able to locate the source. As I searched, cetti's warblers called from behind me and I managed to see them only when they alighted and took off down the path and back into the hedgerow. Swifts, swallow and house martin passed overhead and linnet dropped into the branches and brambles ahead.

More cetti's on the bridleway but I couldn't see them at all. The rain got heavier and became a drizzle by the time I turned into the car park.

Species (49) today included: black-headed gull, blackbird, bullfinch, canada goose, cetti's warbler, chaffinch, chiffchaff, collared dove, common tern, coot, cormorant, cuckoo, gadwall, garden warbler, goldfinch, great crested grebe, great tit, grey heron, greylag goose, house Martin, jackdaw, lapwing, linnet, mallard, marsh harrier, moorhen, mute swan, pheasant, pochard, red kite, redshank, reed bunting, reed warbler, robin, rook, sedge warbler, shoveler, skylark, snipe, swallow, swift, teal, tufted duck, turtle dove, whitethroat, wigeon, willow warbler, woodpigeon and yellowhammer.