I've Isolated and locked down, socially distanced, masked up, anti bac'd, washed my hands and generally done all the things asked of me since early March. I had started the year list well and was approaching 200 as we exited February with little concern for the pandemic that was to hit us in March.
Isolation came my way on 9th March before the national lockdown was imposed on us all.
I sit here now at the end of July on 233 so just the 38 ticks in the last five months and I'm down 36 on last years record year figure for July. By this time last year I had seen 53 birds not seen so far this year so I can hang on to the fact that I've seen a few this year I didn't find last year.
August has been pretty good to me over the years and I have seen the following in the coming month in years gone by.......
Wood Sandpiper
Red-necked Phalarope
Pectoral Sandpiper
Black Tern
White-winged Black Tern
Pied Flycatcher
Arctic Skua
Great Skua
Wryneck
Baird's Sandpiper
White-rumped Sandpiper
Temminck's Stint
Spotted Crake
Bee-eater
Melodious Warbler
Sabine's Gull
Alpine Swift
Long-tailed Skua
Western Sub-alpine Warbler
Ring-billed Gull
Kentish Plover
Storm Petrel
Sooty Shearwater
Buff-breasted Sandpiper
Whinchat
Stilt Sandpiper
So although travel is a little different and since March I've travelled alone which detracts from the experience some and I look forward to sharing the trips with the Jims again before long as the government continues to lift the restrictions placed on us of late. It's fair to say I have a few targets and Wheatear remains top of the list. Every day I get a little closer to the shared car being something I can accept and don't think it'll be long before we become a team again and travel together.
Here's hoping for a decent autumn but I do fear the virus may still have a part to play in the rest of 2020.
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| Sabine's Gull, an August tick of 2013 |
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