checked out Wharf Road for mandarin and sure enough a male ad female were present with seven week-old youngsters although one had a broken leg and would have been taken to Tiggywinkles if I'd caught it...could swim fine so will probably be ok...most wild animals cope really well with injuries if not too debilitating. Mandarin is certainly established locally from its original stronghold in Aylesbury fifteen years ago.

seems to have been a very good breeding season so far this year....garden is alive with young blue and great tits, robins, dunnocks and best of all...house sparrows, which are much in evidence calling from the trees... lovely sound of chirping - long may it continue!!!!!

'Burt' was taken to St Tiggywinkles and handed over to the professionals...you have to be impressed with their knowledge, passion and set-up...good luck to them...went to Wilstone to catch the Mayfly bonanza - hundreds of swifts, a hobby over the reed bed and a superb female ring-necked duck in the evening light....

Oh dear...stood waiting for the girls at Kearsney Abbey a huge , noisy quarrel broke out in the large lime tree overhanging the churchyard and a jay emerged with a chick in its mouth with a pair of blackbirds in hot pursuit. It promptly dropped the poor little sod on the road, flew down and tried to grab it with a couple of stabs and then gave up. The male blackbird briefly examined the chick before flying off. I hadn't intervened but went over to examine the stricken baby expecting it to be dead....

Getting back into the swing of things after my brief sojourn in Australia and a very hectic work schedule. Had a very pleasant afternoon at Dungeness...superb views of hobby, found a whimbrel on Denge marsh and bar-headed geese were an unusual find this far from civilisation. Cetti's warblers everywhere ...a far cry from driving all the way down to Weymouth with McKenna in 2003 to find them....