First, a carbon-powered revisit to Micklemere to tackle the plovers again. When I was bins-only, by-bike on Saturday, I'd nailed Little Ringed (2-3 displaying) and 'left' a few other Charidrids that looked suspicious (as opposed to dubius!) but were just too distant to clinch. Later that evening I noticed a local forum post about the same site from a 'scoped' local who'd seen 5 (Tundra?) Ringed Plovers, just 2 hours before I got there! Returning with scope on Sunday evening, 7 Ringed Plovers were immediately obvious (followed quickly by a Greenshank and a Green Sandpiper - where's the justice?!) so after some thought - and a consultation with the boss - I decided a retrospective tick was in order.
Then to follow up on news of a very interesting unstreaked Acro, found on Sunday morning at another local site. By 9pm MARSH WARBLER (146) was 'carbon-clinched' and - YE GODS! - it was showing knee-tremblingly well1 when I arrived again by bike at 5:30am today! And the icing on the cake: another - non-motorised - Greenshank (147) calling then watched flying off high into the blue.
Keen to cash in on the purple patch, I took the pre-work tripometer to 23 miles by hitting Micklemere too - needless to say, the Greenshank and 2 Little Ringed Plovers were still there, but not a sniff of a Ringed Plover or a Green Sandpiper. Didn't take the shine off a great morning's pedalling though: I'm sure today will be a very strong contender for 'Monday of the Year' (if such a thing exists) - and it's only lunchtime!
1Crippling views, though the knee trembling may have been down to the pre-dawn cycle ride
Percentage of target to date - 95%
Distance cycled - 372.6mls / 599.6km
Latest addition - Greenshank (147) 28 May
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