Woodpecker chuckling about the site at the Ver end all the morning. Blooms still holding on Butterfly Meadow in gorgeous Autumn weather. Dogwoods and Spindles stunning; some of the other trees starting to turn colour now.
Good sighting of pair of Kingfishers. Reports by visitor of Sighting and by Charles and Jenny Luckhurst of hearing Water Rail. Too overgrown to see its usual lurking tunnel at present. More gulls on Mere, gobbling Sticklebacks and defying the Mallard. Autumn colours good this year; unusual because the site is too sheltered for real Autumn tints. Dogwoods and Spindles especially fine in Claret and coral. Still some flowers blooming.
Kingfisher about again, also Woodpecker heard. Heron at bottom of Mere all day. Dozens of small songbirds around site:- Blue and Great tits, Long tails, Robins, Wren, Dunnock and a solitary Songthrush, all packing in the feed to put on fat for the coming hard times. Autumn colours deepening, but still there are blooms on the now rather ratty-looking Butterfly Meadow.
Only the waterfowl and the very strongest flyers about in the gale on Sunday. It seemed as though every other vertebrate apart from daft humans in hiding. All flora battered to bits.