Sunday 12 May 2024

Alpine Accentor - 5.5.24

 



Alpine Accentor

There I was mowing the grass at home when a message came through of an Alpine Accentor having been found in Buckinghamshire of all places by a man looking for rare mosses! A few minutes later it was revealed to be in Pitstone Quarry and became the first modern day inland record!! Sadly like the Stilt it was within view of the Herts border but refused to budge. 

I contacted Ben Miller who was on site and said it’d gone missing for the last 90 minutes so I carried on gardening. George Moreton called a bit later to say he was watching it so I decided to head up and nabbed Ben’s parking spot. Access into the quarry was fun and after a gruelling few minutes I joined the group of birders watching the bird and was treated to excellent views of it feeding on a small cliff face. This was much better viewing than my only previous record at Minsmere back in 2002. I watched it for about 20 minutes or so before joining Matt and his wife on a much nicer walk back to the car. Yellowhammer and Lesser Whitethroat were nice bonus year ticks. 

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