Shreeep shreeep!

Richard's Pipit (Sacha Barbato)

What a morning!

After spending one and a quarter hours watching visible migration on the edge of the grassland at The Scrubs, Roy Nuttall and I had clocked up over 700 Redwings heading west, c130 Fieldfare including one on the deck, c500 Starlings, c300 Woodpigeons, 41 Jackdaws, 2 Mistle Thrushes, around 20 Redpolls, maybe 10 Chaffinches and many unidentified small flying objects.

At 8.45am Roy decided that he had had enough and began stroll off. I too thought that it was time to go, but I decided to give it just 5 more minutes before I had to run and rescue my car from a potential parking ticket. I turned to the grassland and within seconds a large pipit rose from it around 50 feet away and flew over my head calling 'shreep' as it did so. I yelled at Roy to watch the bird as it headed southwest.

As soon as I heard it initially call I instinctively knew it was a Richard's and I immediately started to register the salient identification points; build, pot belly, size and sparrow-like call.

Yowza! Our 3rd ever Dick's Pipit at The Scrubs - and I found 2 of them!

I'm really getting excited about the next film that I'm doing with Birdguides next Sunday morning. I will be on the top of one of London's tallest buildings - 600 feet up on Tower 42 (the old Nat West Building). The aim is to watch visible migration from this potentially amazing vantage point.

Roll on Sunday!