Another “non-wildlife” day today, with not even Brenda having time (between multiple services and meetings) to write anything! I was conducting in Ely all day – a shame to be inside on such a lovely day, but the start of a new season with Ely Sinfonia and an exciting programme of music to rehearse.
We definitely have an “Indian summer” in place at the moment: Not the levels of heat we had last summer, but it’s pretty hot all the same. I’m seeing bird migration reports from around the country and the big birding news recently has been the UK’s 2nd ever red-footed booby seen near the Isles of Scilly, coupled with sightings of a very mobile brown booby (or maybe more than one?) around the country (not as rare but still very rare). Some lucky birders on one of the regular Scilly pelagic boat trips even saw both birds on the same day!
Boobies are relations of gannets, seabirds that dive at great speed to catch fish. Our vagrant boobies should really be somewhere in the tropics and not hanging around the UK coastline…**
I have only ever seen one species of booby, the blue-footed, in Mexico in 2012, alongside amazing magnificent frigatebirds. That was a great trip for birds!
No new species for September 3rd:
TOTALS TO DATE:
Birds = 215
Moths = 220
Wildflowers = 275
** At the time of writing this (9th September) the brown booby is currently just off the coast near Hartlepool