The return of Monsieur Richard

Top day at the rugger on Saturday, minutes applause in memory of Phil Hughes, quality game, England win, nice. Meanwhile back at the patch... Geoff has re-found the Richards' Pipit he first found on the 6th in the same field, great find! Sunday morning therefore was an early start, dawn on Horse-eye with Matt Eade for company along with a couple of early morning Shorties which soon moved off and not a lot else until I wandered off to check some of the other fields, when a shout from Matt got me running back to find monsieur Richard walking through the grass at the back of the field. We watched the bird for a few minutes before it walked out of sight and then put the news out that the bird was still present. This resulted in a minor twitch as illustrated below.

I am almost ashamed to post the heavily cropped shot of the bird on the right however have done so purely on the basis that it does portray the size of the bill and the supercilium, and no it is not a Redwing! To be honest the bird was a complete b****r all day disappearring for quite long spells and only showing at distances down to about 100 yards, although well enough through a scope. I only heard it call on a couple of occassions and I was on site all day bar an hour or so though not always by the birds field. The day got even better when Gordon Beck rocked up and mentioned that he had just seen a Dartford Warbler back down the road in the brambles by Lookers' Cottage. A quick mosy down quickly produced the harsh "chzzzzh" of a Dartford followed by it perching up on the brambles, and it later posed for the below average picture above.
Other sightings for the day comprised 8 Golden Plover, 3+ Marsh Harrier, 3+ Buzzard, 5+ SEO which as usual provided a quality performance towards the end of the day, ringtail Hen Harrier, Sparrowhawk, Raven, Kingfisher, Cettis', Water Rail, and numerous Kestrel, Fieldfare, and Redwing.