The Obs quarry birds

08 Thursday Oct 2026

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I can never visit Portland Bill without checking the old quarry in the field adjacent to the bird observatory to see if the resident Little owl is at home. When I stopped off during a circuit of the east cliffs, the Bill, and the fields up the hill from the Obs on Thursday 24 September, the owl was nowhere to be seen but, as I stood searching with my binoculars every nook and cranny between the large blocks of stone, a Kestrel flew in. It perched on a rock at the top of the quarry, started calling and peering down at the rocks, as if it too was looking for the Little owl. In my imagination it was calling ‘Hey, little mate. Are you here? Come out and play!’ There was no response and the Kestrel flew off.

The next day, the 25th, I was back on Portland, walking a different route, but I detoured once again past the Obs quarry. And this time the Little owl was at home, sitting in its usual spot, preening. You can’t get very close to the bird – and I certainly wouldn’t want to disturb it – so my photos of it aren’t great.

However, during this visit I also took a very short video clip of it preening, which I thought you might enjoy.

Starlings at Portland Bill

07 Wednesday Oct 2026

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Even above the loud chattering of tourists and the crashing of the mighty ocean waves, you can hear the Starlings that make their home at Portland Bill**, though it did take me a few moments to realise where their musical chirps and squeaks were coming from. (My first photo is taken from the rock in the former quarry at the Bill where I was sitting while eating my lunch. The lighthouse looks short from this angle but is actually 41 metres / 134.5 feet tall.)

Look more closely at the lighthouse and you can see Starlings clinging to every available object jutting out from the building – the railings that criss-cross the light are popular, and perched along the outer ledge just beneath the level of the light. And these are just a small number of the substantial local population. Others sit on the roof of a local café, waiting to snatch any crumbs left by the customers. Still more fly in small flocks, swooping on to the grass to feed, swirling skyward in a mini murmuration at the slightest disturbance.

As I walked from the Bill towards the Obs, I passed a noisy flock of Starlings inhabiting a large area of bramble scrub near the local houses, and that’s where I took the photo below. These birds are very used to the locals passing close by and weren’t at all bothered by my presence, as I stood enjoying their jazz-time melodies and admiring the metallic hues and arrow-like markings of their plumage. They really are stunning birds.

** If you want to see the area I’m talking about, the Visit Dorset website has a great drone image, taken from slightly out to sea from the iconic red-and-white lighthouse, looking back at the island. Portland Bird Observatory – the Obs – is located in the small, former lighthouse you can see at the back of the photo, on the right side.

Late Dorset dragons

06 Tuesday Oct 2026

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The dragonflies were a little disappointing during my most recent visit to Dorset but that was really only because I had been spoilt by the wonderful dragons I had seen during my mini-breaks earlier in the year; in later September the flight season for the majority of British dragonfly species is already over. There were still a lot of very active Migrant hawkers, I suspect there were a couple of Emperors in the mix, as well as a sprinkling of Common darters, and there may possibly have been Southern hawkers, as I’m still seeing those in south Wales, but, as is the way with hawker dragonflies, they weren’t stopping for photographs. It took about 30 minutes of patiently standing watching and waiting to get the photo of the Migrant hawker shown below.

My odonatan highlight came on the afternoon of the Spoonbill sighting. I’d caught the bus to Portland, walked the western coastal path, and was about to wander the footpaths through the fields north of Portland Bird Observatory, when I spotted Observatory warden Martin taking a photo of something in the field nearest the road. Curiosity aroused, I wandered over for a chat. I’m an Obs supporter and I’d stayed there a couple of times on bird club trips but I hadn’t really talked to Martin. We chewed the birding fat, then I asked what he’d been photographing. Turns out, he’d just caught a Lesser emperor in the mist nets they use to catch birds for ringing. He obviously has a way with wildlife, as the creature had allowed him to place it on a dried stalk and was still perched there, right in front of us. So, of course, I also took the opportunity to get some close-up images of this handsome migrant dragonfly.

A surprise Spoonbill

05 Monday Oct 2026

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Timing is everything!

On the third day of my recent Weymouth holiday my 7:45am arrival at RSPB Lodmoor was perfect. I had just started to walk along the western footpath and stopped to scan the birds with my binoculars, when I noticed a very interesting new arrival feeding right in front of the viewing shelter.

I can walk very fast when I have to and my stumpy legs really got cracking that morning. In the blink of an eye (slight exaggeration!) I had walked around to the shelter, and was watching this Spoonbill (Platalea leucorodia) as it swept its wide flat bill back and forth through the water, scooping up and swallowing the small creatures it was catching.

I had only ever seen Spoonbills at some distance before so I was delighted to spend time watching this bird, a juvenile according to other local birders who also managed to see it a little later in the day.

According to an article on the RSPB website, Spoonbills were once a familiar sight in Britain, until ‘drainage of wetland habitats and hunting resulted in a population crash’. They were last recorded nesting in Suffolk in 1668 and were not known to have bred again until the late 1990s, over 300 years later. Now, they breed regularly at Holkham National Nature Reserve in Norfolk, and at RSPB Fairburn Ings in Yorkshire, as well as a very small number of other locations.

Late Dorset butterflies

04 Sunday Oct 2026

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Only eight species of butterfly were seen in Weymouth and on the Isle of Portland last week, as it’s now late in the year for most butterfly species, and the season for many is already over.

A lovely surprise was this rather faded Wall fluttering along a path at RSPB Lodmoor, likely the same specimen seen two days running. I did spend a morning walking around the disused quarries on Portland, and was told by a chap surveying a transect at Tout Quarry that he’d seen a couple of Wall that morning but I didn’t spot any as I subsequently wandered around the quarry.

Two Small heath in the neighbouring King Barrow Quarry were an unexpected surprise. The Dorset Butterflies website says there are ‘Two broods, the first starting in May and peaking in June, going through into July, and the second emerging in August and going through to September in smaller numbers’, so I was lucky to see these so late in September.

Not surprisingly given what an amazing influx we have seen this year, there were Clouded yellows everywhere, and I couldn’t resist taking even more photographs of these golden beauties. I’m going to have to be ruthless when I go through this year’s photos deleting those I don’t want to keep.

Otherwise, I found the odd Painted lady, quite a lot of Red admirals getting ready to depart on their return migration south to Europe’s warmer wintering grounds, a few late Common blues, some Small whites, and a number of Speckled woods. And I enjoyed seeing each and every one of them, knowing they will soon all be gone for the year.

The Ferrybridge gang

03 Saturday Oct 2026

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I have limited success birding the beach at Ferrybridge, at the start of the causeway that connects Weymouth to the Isle of Portland. As I don’t visit often, I’m not very familiar with the tides – I consult tide charts, of course, but I don’t know the tidal ranges, nor can I predict how quickly the birds will return to the beach on the ebbing tide. And when the tide is out, you really need a telescope to be able to accurately identify any birds along the water’s edge. Still, I persevere, and I managed to see a few bird species during one of my attempts last week, by sitting on a concrete slipway alongside the road as the tide came in. These are they …

There were a lot of Ringed plover scooting around but I only spotted a single Sanderling (the bird on the left) amongst them.

Most of the birds were strung out across the beach so I was pleased to find these four species close enough to photograph together: Knot, Ringed plover, Oystercatcher, and Dunlin.

The Knot was new for my year list so I took a few photos of it, though it was too distant for anything sharp.

Fairy inkcaps

02 Friday Oct 2026

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Fungi are fabulous, and none are more fabulous than profusions of fungi like these Fairy inkcaps (Coprinellus disseminatus).

Is it any wonder the Fairy inkcap is also known as the Trooping inkcap? In Fascinated by Fungi, author Pat O’Reilly takes this alternative common name and let’s his imagination run riot with it: ‘You may think that the Terracotta Army is something special, but save your superlatives until you come across your first battalion of Fairy inkcaps swarming over a rotten hardwood stump in a sunlit woodland clearing.’

The three ‘battalions’ shown here were in different woodland locations, all found on the same day, and my photos don’t show the full extent of any of their swarms – they were extensive, and delightful to see. Their caps start off a creamy colour, as in the photo above, before turning grey as they mature (photos one and three).

Returning Pale-bellied Brent geese

01 Thursday Oct 2026

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Last Wednesday, on day two of my Weymouth / Portland trip, by sheer chance, as I was walking along the disused railway track next to Hamm Beach, I just happened to be the first birder to spot the first two Pale-bellied Brent geese to return to Portland from their breeding grounds.

Portland Bird Observatory warden Martin later told me this first sighting had been on the exact same date, 23 September, as in 2025. Brent geese come in two sub-species, Pale-bellied (Branta bernicla hrota) and Dark-bellied (Branta bernicla bernicla). Martin says the Pale-bellied return to Portland first as they have a shorter distance to travel from their breeding grounds in northern Canada; the Dark-bellied Brents breed in the Russian Arctic. There’s not a lot of difference in their arrival dates though, as the first six Dark-bellied Brents were reported at Hamm Beach on 28 September, just five days after the two birds pictured here.

According to another local birder, these two Pale-bellied Brents are an adult and a juvenile. They look almost exactly the same to my inexperienced eye but I believe the juvenile (below) has less of a white collar than the adult (above).

A Yellow wagtail up close

30 Wednesday Sep 2026

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If there hadn’t been four Glossy ibis at RSPB Lodmoor on day one of my latest birding week in Dorset, this gorgeous Yellow wagtail (Motacilla flava) would’ve been the absolute highlight.

Though I’d spotted, and heard, several dotting around the reserve, this one popped up from where it was foraging on the salt marsh into a tree above where I was standing chatting with two other birders.

The wagtail wasn’t at all bothered about our proximity, and proceeded to have a good preen, giving us excellent views and photo opportunities.

Though I’ve seen Yellow wagtails many times before, usually as they pass along the south Wales coastline during autumn migration, this was definitely my closest encounter with one, and by far my best photos. What a treat!

Four Glossy ibis

29 Tuesday Sep 2026

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Unfortunately I can’t share with you any images of the absolute highlight of last week’s return visit to the Dorset seaside town of Weymouth. It actually happened very quickly when I was on the train to Weymouth, travelling along the edge of Poole Harbour, so I didn’t have time to get my phone out, let alone my good camera. There were two White-tailed eagles sitting on the shoreline no more than 20 metres from the train!!!!! I could scarcely believe my eyes but, when I later asked online, the company that runs birding cruises around the harbour confirmed the location was indeed a place the eagles are known to sit. Incredible, and a lifer for me.

I was a bit concerned that I’d peaked too early, that the rest of the week’s birding would be disappointing compared to that experience but, as you can guess from the photos above, I needn’t have worried. These four black-looking birds are Glossy ibis (Plegadis falcinellus) and they are anything but black, their stunning plumage ranging from bronze and metallic greens through brownish purple. My Lodmoor photos don’t show this but I blogged about this species the second time I saw one, back in May 2018, and those photos and a short video give better views.

This species used to be rare in Britain but is now seen increasingly often and, according to the BTO website, pairs began breeding in Britain in 2022. Glossy ibis are mostly located in southern Britain, but do range further north. The bird I saw in that 2018 blog was at Druridge Pools in Northumberland, in north-eastern England.

The Lodmoor four were mostly distant and easily spooked, flying back and forth from the main waterways to what’s called the postbox pool, on the northern side of the reserve. (The other birds in the flight photos above and below are Black-tailed godwits.) This was just my fourth time seeing these stunning birds and my first time seeing more than one, so I was very pleased with my first day in Weymouth, especially as they weren’t all I saw that day. More on that tomorrow …