Gropper Dip!!

2 Gropper's turn up on the same day, one at ASF, the other at Pole Cottage. Andy & Jim texted me yesterday to say the Gropper was reeling & showing occaisionally. With work looming I raced up to Pole Cottage, I arrived and heard the distant reeling, I had just retrieved my bins from the boot of the car, looked up to see a dog racing through the heather!!... The bird didn't call again! In fact, the bird wasn't seen or heard since!!! If only I ticked bird's on call, eh?....

However, I was back at Pole Cottage around 08:30am this morning, although it was soon apparent that it did indeed appear that the Gropper had indeed gone, there was plenty of stuff knocking about...
A Red Kite was gliding nearby on arrival, a very showy Red Grouse near the car park, then I saw the first of two Whinchat!! At last, a year tick!!! The two birds were typically showy & fairly mobile.
Then my second tick, a Tree Pipit flew into Pole Cottage & perched in a nearby tree for a short while, before flying off south... A Merlin did a couple of fly-pasts in typical high speed mode!
There was also 2 Wheatear perched on posts inside the plantation area, also a Garden Warbler was present.
A search for Dotterel drew a blank, but I did find a superb full summer pl. Golden Plover!!!

So, a kindda resolve with 2 year ticks, but yet another painful dip & certain birds are still proving tricky to locate! But, saying that, in the final week of April my county year list sits at a pretty impresive 140 species!!! So, it's getting there slowly & still plenty of 'certs' still to get!!...