Sunday 26th April

Well, so far no sign of the Purple Patch that I was forecasting on Wednesday but there's been a steady trickle of new year ticks over the last few days. I heard the first REED WARBLER of the year in the reedbed of the Trap Grounds and finally managed to find a couple of singing GARDEN WARBLERS of my own in the Burgess Field as well. The GRASSHOPPER WARBLER along the canal has been hanging around and may even decide to stay, though sadly there have been no further reports of the Cetti's. As reported previously, there are loads of WHITETHROATS back in Burgess Field now.

The floods have had a reprieve thanks to the reasonable rain that we had over the weekend and with the forecast looking a little more wet over the coming week we may stave off the inevitable for a few weeks yet. The EGYPTIAN GEESE have been lingering, clearing finding the grass by the floods to their liking. On the wader front we've had a couple of LITTLE RINGED PLOVERS and one OYSTERCATCHER still hanging around and this evening the first two COMMON SANDPIPERS of the year finally turned up - I've been expecting them for a couple of weeks now. A couple of COMMON TERNS were hanging out on the floods yesterday - actually sitting on a large stone in the middle of the flood water in the evening and this evening Steve Lavington found four YELLOW WAGTAILS.

James Evry managed to find a CUCKOO up near Godstow yesterday, a most welcome find of what is sadly becoming an increasingly rare bird in this country. Finally I had the first SWIFT of the year soaring over my house this evening.

The two Common Terns yesterday evening

Sharp-eyed Adam Bassett pointed out that there are actually 20 Whimbrel in Roger Wyatt's flight photo that I posted yesterday. I can confirm that there were only 18 on the deck when I went to see them so I presume that 2 decided not to stop off.