June 2016

Highlights of the month
London’s headline bird in June was undoubtedly the Spotted Sandpiper at Brent Reservoir on 11th June. In dapper, dappled summer plumage, it was found at about 8am and then showed itself on and off until dusk, allowing about 50 Brent Birders and London twitchers to catch up with it. It was apparently the first Spotty in the London recording area since one at Hilfield Park Reservoir some 20 years ago, the first twitchable bird in London since 1988 and the first Brent Reservoir record since one was shot dead early in the 19th century.

Many of Brent’s Spotty-spotters dashed off to catch up with a Purple Heron that graced Rye Meads NR until lunchtime on the same day.

What else? Well, at 6am on 19th June, Richard Francis was lying in bed in Pinner listening to his garden birds when he heard the unmistakable call of a Golden Oriole. He dashed out, “wearing only optics and underpants”, but the bird refused to call again.

Then at lunchtime on the same day, a keen young birder called Arjun Dutta (he’s in Year 8, which makes him 12 or 13 years old), was playing cricket at King’s College Playing Fields, New Malden, when he was almost hit by the ball. Why? Because he was distracted by a Golden Oriole feeding on the pitch. The bird flew into nearby woodland, where it obligingly gave its beautiful fluting call.

Also on that day a male Golden Oriole was reported from Barnes (Beverley Brook bridge), although the anonymous observer did not give the time. Could these three reports all be the same bird, working its way south?

The month’s only other reported Golden Oriole was one singing at Rainham Marshes on 10th June — the year’s first for the London area.

Another unusual sighting on 10th June was a female ‘’’Goldeneye’’’ with young at Springwell Lake, Harefield. The same bird, identifiable by a metal ring on its left leg, also produced young here in 2014. Since Goldeneye do not normally breed closer to London than the Scottish Highlands, it may well be a fence-hopper — but who knows? A drake Goldeneye — the putative father of the brood — was seen at nearby Stocker’s Lake on 16th and 21st June.

May’s Bird of the Month, the ‘’’Little Bittern’’’ found at the London Wetland Centre on 29th May, continued to attract birders until it last showed itself on the afternoon of 3rd June. Within a few days, the same site also produced a ‘’’Spotted Redshank‘’’ (7th June) and a pair of ‘’’Garganey‘’’ (8th June).

Barking Bay is proving an interesting site for larids — at least on Fridays in early June. On 3rd June it produced five ‘’’Little Tern‘’’, two ‘’’Arctic Tern‘’’, a ‘’’Yellow-legged Gull‘’’ and a ‘’’Little Gull‘’’. Seven days later there were two ‘’’Yellow-legged Gull‘’’ and a ‘’’Mediterranean Gull‘’’, plus an ‘’’Arctic Tern‘’’ feeding with about 130 ‘’’Common Tern‘’’.

Woodberry Wetlands, the new nature reserve centred on Stoke Newington’s previously inaccessible East Reservoir, has produced some good sightings since its official opening on 30th April. The star birds so far are a pair of ‘’’Black-necked Grebe‘’’ that spent the day there on 22nd June. Other species recorded this month (mainly by regular visitor Chris Farthing) include: breeding Gadwall, Grey Wagtail, Sedge Warbler and Coal Tit; nest-building Great Crested Grebe; displaying Little Ringed Plover; a pair of Shelduck throughout the month and sometimes a pair of Egyptian Geese; regular Little Egret, Kestrel and Peregrine; and occasional Shoveler, Red-crested Pochard, Common Tern and Sand Martin — not bad for a site exactly four miles from St Paul’s Cathedral, the epicentre of the LNHS recording area.