Lockdown Diary: Friday 1.5.20

Being officially on holiday, I decided to have a slightly more extended vigil around Ferry Meadows CP this morning. I also knew I would be around a while, as I had to take my bike to have some minor repairs, and as it happens I was booked in to the bike shop on the road into the park itself (luckily still open during the lockdown).
Things were going well with the addition of a singing Reed Warbler (113 for my FM 2020 list [FM = Ferry Meadows CP]), and I had racked up a decent 62 species, before I had to go to the bike place, including a family of Grey Wagtails with full-grown youngsters (which seems really early), Nuthatch, lesser Whitethroat and a sighting of a Red Kite still sitting on its nest.
But as I was leaving the park into Ham Lane, I heard a brief snatch of song to my right. I stopped and listened again: “Probably a misheard bit of Wren song”. But it sang again and it was unmistakable, the spinning silver sixpence song of a Wood Warbler. Wood Warbler is easily the best bird I have seen in the park this year, and easily the best bird I have found locally all year. They are seriously scarce passage birds through Peterborough; for years they were one of my main bogey birds. But now (in 20 years) I have found two (and seen a further three). This is my second for Ferry Meadows and only my first singer there. What a great bird, to liven up any day!

Wood Warbler, Ferry Meadows CP, Peterborough, 1.5.20 (Mike Weedon)

'Spinning silver' sixpence song

'Anxiety' call