Friday 14^th started of overcast and still, but ended warm sunny and fairly breezy. Sightings from the Brownsea Lagoon included a 1^st summer Little Gull, Arctic Tern, 8 Avocet, 1 Bar-tailed Godwit, 6 Dunlin and a Lesser-spotted Woodpecker has been seen in the woodland on the DWT reserve. A late report of the Poole Harbour Osprey was received from yesterday. At Swineham 30+ Swift were feeding over the main gravel pit, only 2 Black-tailed Godwit were on the pools and at least 15 Reed Bunting counted. 

It’s also the time of year when local raptor experts carry out their monitoring of hawk and owl boxes to ring the young and monitor the increase/decrease in local populations. I was lucky enough to join them one morning and although most of the boxes we checked were out of the Poole Harbour area, it’s very obvious that many Barn Owls are at least a month behind and that Kestrels seem to have had a bit of a tough time this spring, with the number of chicks fairly low across all boxes checked.