A total of 4 Common Terns on Walton Heath this Monday morning as was a Lesser Black Backed gull that was busy swallowing a young Moorhen! The Terns were flying between Durstons Peat works to the south and the general Ham Wall area.
Yesterday at 19.40 single Tern left the small pontoon in Ham Wall lagoon flying towards Walton Moor...returned about 20 mins later with 2 others...they then dive bombed a settled Heron on the larger pontoon which was there before the Tern left, it ducked a few times but they failed to move it...they flew away back over Walton Moor.
Still 4 at 1615 yesterday (4th) - though I thought I saw a 5th. 2 Bittern seen, 1 GWE, just 1 Hobby, 1 kingfisher but the most extraordinary thing was the Swifts and House Matins (and a few Sans) - literally thousands of Swifts hunting from head height to hundreds of feet up - has this been normal or is it them finding better hunting over the warmer water in the atrocious wet 7 cold weather yesterday ?
When poor weather is around, Swifts will often gather in sometimes huge numbers and move sometimes large distances ahead of a front, trying to keep out of the weather - not just to find food, but also to avoid being grounded by heavy rain, as once they are on the ground they find it very difficult to get airborne again. So gatherings like the one you witnessed, Roderick, are not normal, but happen occasionally - and are spectacular when they do!
