On the 17 March, a Bluethroat was found at Swineham just before dusk by local Birders who were hoping to see a Bittern or two depart Eastwards from the Swineham reedbed. It would have been tight for me to get there in time to see it and as it was just outside of the Isle of Purbeck boundary, there was no burning reason to try to get there before dark. It was looked for the next day with no joy: c'est la vie. We all assumed it was a passing one day migrant as Swineham is fairly well watched, especially in the Bittern season. Therefore, it was a big surprise when it was refound on 11 April.
I left it a couple of days before I made the effort to get there for the early morning. I joined a group of about six Birders & toggers at the corner overlooking Swineham Point. It had been seen a few times already and after a fifteen minute wait, it reappeared in a bare tree about thirty metres away. I saw it a couple of times before it stopped showing after 08:30. Other visiting Birders and toggers were going past us to look for it on the path. When I finally decided to try the path, there was a queue just to get to a viewing position to see where it was showing. It turns out that it was being enticed onto the path by togger mealworms and by the end of the month, it must have been addicted to them.
Given I wasn't going to wait in the queue for an hour to get to a viewing position, I decided to check out the rest of the Swineham riverbank path. I hadn't even reached the start of the riverbank path, when I saw a couple of pairs of Bearded Tits. There was clearly a territorial dispute going on with the two males keen to sit up and show their presence. Eventually, the Easterly pair headed towards the Point and the other pair disappeared back into the reeds. It was my best view of Bearded Tits for many years, given they were only about fifteen metres from the footpath.
