July is really picking up now, and with first Grasshopper Warblers, Garden Warblers and Willow Warblers already being ringed at Durlston yesterday, the autumn floodgates will soon be well and truly open. We had a busy Summer Safari Cruise this evening with plenty of highlights including male Osprey 022 with a fish in the Wareham Channel, 1 juv Marsh Harrier in the Frome mouth, 1 distant White-tailed Eagle on the Holton shore, 4 Spotted Redshank, 4 Greenshank and c700 Black-tailed Godwit in the Wareham Channel, 7 Spoonbill, 5 Dunlin and the Avocet family all doing well on the Brownsea Lagoon. At Swineham there was an adult Yellow-legged Gull on the scrapes, a Starling flock of around c400 birds and c200 Sand Martin were gathering in the pre-roost. At the Osprey site today a Hobby flew over the valley, at the Stoborough causeway there were 5 Cattle Egret and there were 4 Whimbrel and 2 Common Sandpiper in Holes Bay.

Finally, we saw the first fledging of the season from one of our Osprey chicks, with the youngest ‘5H3’ being the surprise first youngster to take the leap. He did brilliantly flying around the nest before settling in nearby dead trees for 20 minutes before then expertly returning to the nest and crash landing on top of CJ7! The whole family were back on the nest this evening but no doubt the rest will give flying a go over the next few days. Perhaps we might see an empty nest by the end of the week?!