I'm currently trying to clear a backlog of old UK photos that have accumulating over the last few years and which is clogging up my laptop. Today's Blog Post is appropriate as I'm writing this as the current Hippo season in Dorset is approaching. I had spent the previous day back in Aug 19 emptying and refilling my large pond: the first time for over a decade. I was still aching & when I saw the weather was foggy the following morning, it was a good reason not to go out Birding to St Aldhelms.
However, fellow patch watcher, Phil Saunders, had driven over from Bournemouth & decided to give it a go, as he was there. Phil rang me late morning to say he had found a Melodious Warbler when the fog cleared. It was patrolling around a few bushes at the top of Pier Bottom valley. I rang the news around. Steve Morrison, who was currently in the UK that year from his French home, & I headed down to have a look for it. We spread out when we reached Pier Bottom. It only took a few minutes to relocate and it was in the same two bushes that Phil had seen it an hour earlier. If only other Melodious Warblers were as well behaved. They generally have a habit of skulking & not showing well.
Very quickly, we could confirm it was a Melodious Warbler, not that Phil was going to get it confused with an Icterine Warbler. My other St Aldhelms Melodious Warbler, was identified as an Icterine Warbler on 15 Aug 1996. I saw it poorly on the following day and reidentified it as a Melodious Warbler. This didn't go down well with the finder & the other local Birder who had seen it on the first day. However, they conceded I was correct when we saw it for its final day on the 17th.
It would be nice to see a local Icterine Warbler.
