Not the best weather at GWH being typically overcast but luckily pretty sheltered from a light breeze, and virtually no-one else in the grounds.
The Epistrophe diaphana below was the first in a long time and the Downland Villa was the first this year as was an Emperor dragonfly on the pond. A variety of hoverflies all posted to FB Hoverfly Group and the list stored in Bird Journal.
Birds were typically thin-on-the-ground but nice to watch a point blank Marsh Tit in the herb garden and a Wren feeding a gape-flanged youngster. Just a few Common Spotted Orchids scattered around the site.
After last nights reports of little Nightjar activity at Ambersham, presumably due to cold weather and so few moths, it seemed sensible to opt out of tonight's event with SDOS/BFF. Maybe a little later in the summer - if it ever arrives.
The day before saw a very brief visit to WWT, mostly to kill a little time over coffee and breakfast roll. No Kingfisher activity but plenty of Sand Martin's coming and going.
The grounds of Worthing Crematorium are very pleasant and with the sun out it certainly lightened the mood of what is always at best, a sombre occasion.
And then on to PB and a catch up with Gary whilst watching a few Hobbies - with some of MJ's photos from last Wednesday now on X/Twitter.
This morning's early Savi's Warbler was only putative at this point and it was only after leaving that more people managed to hear and briefly glimpse this hard-to-see LBJ with a similar situation on Wednesday and even less of a performance on Thursday. My last encounter with this species was a spring singing bird at Stodmarsh in 1992 but easily eclipsed by the bird I extracted from a mist net at Farlington and for which I was the sole observer. It took a little while to realise what I was dealing with - and, if I remember rightly, a BBRC submission was required. It finally appeared in John Clark's recent book on Hampshire's rare birds - sadly attributed to someone else!!!
(Volucella pellucens, unknown bee, Epistrophe diaphana, Villa cingulata, Cheilosia illustrata)
