April 2025

I enjoyed an excellent April at the Ardley ERF/Quarry patch with plenty of year ticks and also a few patch firsts. Up until now it has been the ERF lagoon that has attracted the waders over the past few years, but landscaping of an area of the quarry towards the end of last year created a nice shallow lake which looked perfect for passing waders. JFT and I have anticipated pretty much everything dropping in and for me at least I managed to get some really good birds even if some of those hoped for haven't appeared. But there's still time. 

The stand-out bird of the month for me was a Whimbrel on 11th April. Unfortunately it flew almost as soon as I arrived and after circling a couple of times it headed off west, but did give me some nice flypasts before it went. It marks another great bird for the patch and another good species of wader to add to the list. Another new wader for me this month was Oystercatcher. Despite being relatively common locally I've never seen one at Ardley up until now. JFT had Curlews on two occasions on the quarry. I was fortunate late in the month to see two flying over the site from the car as I drove past. It seems likely these are birds from the Mid-Cherwell Valley that are using the quarry as a place to wash and preen. And the final highlight for me on the wader-front was five Greenshank on 19th April. Although almost annual here, it's the first spring record for me and five is a good number at any time locally. Like the Whimbrel, unfortunately the didn't hang about for long.

   

A Common Sandpiper and up to 8 Little Ringed Plovers were also present on the quarry during the month. Three Ringed Plovers were present on 30th.

Relegated to "also-rans" this month, but very good patch birds were a Great White Egret and a pair of Shoveler. Only my second and third records of these species, respectively.

Wheatears have become a bit of an Ardley speciality in the past few years with almost double figure counts at times in spring. For whatever reason this year has not seen many locally and the only one at Ardley was a female JFT found mid-month. Yellow wagtails have been present in good numbers which I've detailed in another blog post here:

https://woodstockwildlife.blogspot.com/2025/05/yellow-wagtails-april-2025.html

As usual Ardley seems to do well to support some of the declining UK species with plenty of Skylarks, Linnets and at least one pair of Grey Partridges. A pair of Mistle Thrushes has fledged at least one chick which is good to see. The pair of Shelduck have been present throughout the month. The male is often chasing Mallards off the quarry but whether this territorial behaviour leads to a breeding attempt remains to be seen. Once again a pair of Little Grebes has young on the Trow Pool.

It was good to see the return of the Cattle Egrets to the breeding site on the Queen Pool island at Blenheim. They arrived back slightly later than in previous years but it seems likely a handful of pairs will be successful once more. A drop of Common Sandpipers at Blenheim at the end of the month was an unusual surprise. There were at least 7, most of which congregated on the base of the Grand Bridge. 

Away from the usual haunts I took in the dozen or so Little Gulls that arrived at Dix Pit during the month. It would have been a shame to miss out on them this spring given they've been passing through in good numbers. So although it felt a little lacking at times, all in all I cannot really complain with this month's birding.