Today saw the first real ‘trickle’ (and a trickle it was) of spring migrants with Wheatear at Portland and Sand Martin in north Dorset, and although neither have occurred in the harbour yet we did manage to ring what is likely to be our first migrant Chiffchaff this morning in the north of the harbour, showing possibly a small amount of Pollen around the base of the bill, picked up whilst feeding on migration up through Europe. A re-trap Firecrest was also caught along with several re-trap over-wintering Chiffchaff. In Holes Bay north 2 Spotted Redshank were at the outflow with c200 Black-tailed Godwit and c50 Dunlin on the mud. After analysing our night recordings from Saturday night it was clear that Redwing are still passing over in good numbers during the night. With last nights total added to the previous two nights we encountered 2261 Redwing calls and 252 Blackbird calls over the course of the three nights. These figures will only represent a percentage of birds actually passing over as not all birds are calling, so the true figure of Redwing and Blackbird passing over our station over the last three nights is almost certainly much much greater. Totals from our latest ‘invis- mig’ (thanks Daragh for the phrase) session included…

Redwing calls – 532

Blackbird calls – 56

Song Thrush calls – 5

Starling – 1

Curlew – 3

Oystercatcher – 4

Wigeon flock – 1

As promised here are selection of recordings made during the last three nights as birds were moving above our listening station. Given that our recording station is in the centre of Poole you’ll have to try and ignore the rumble of background traffic!

Coot – Night time migrant over nocturnal listening station, Poole – 22:54

Moorhen – Night time migrant over nocturnal listening station, Poole – 00:15

Teal – Calls of several birds over nocturnal listening station, Poole – 19:05

Fieldfare – call of a night time migrant from nocturnal listening station, Poole – 23:43

Blackbird and Redwing – Calls of passing migrants over nocturnal listening station, Poole – 22:01

Wigeon flock with Redwing – Calls over nocturnal listening station, Poole – 23:35

Oystercatcher – Calls of bird passing over nocturnal listening station, Poole – 21:14