Newsround 31st May to 6th June 2025

A westerly airstream off the Atlantic remained in place for much of the period, bringing in numerous heavy showers along with largely below average temperatures and few new migrants. While what is likely to be the last of this year’s new summer visitors made it onto the clock, the week’s two potentially top birds fell into the unconfirmed bracket through hearsay, and all that …

Never common, but even scarcer than they used to be, a male Quail – the year’s first – was singing in a field adjacent to Stanford Res from 2nd until 4th.

The sole representative of its tribe was, once again, the idling drake Red-crested Pochard at Earls Barton GP, remaining there until at least 4th.

Constituting the fifth report for 2025, six Common Cranes in flight over Earls Barton GP’s Grendon Lakes during the closing hours of the week remains just that until further details emerge …

On the ground, though, Avocets were still very much in evidence, with two at Summer Leys LNR on 3rd and up to eight in the wider environs of Earls Barton GP throughout the period.

Although in short supply, other waders were available and a, or the, Tundra Ringed Plover was again at Lilbourne Meadows NR on 3rd, a colour-ringed Black-tailed Godwit paid a brief visit to Earls Barton GP’s New Workings (South) on 4th and a straggling Sanderling remained at Clifford Hill GP from 4th until 6th.

Gulls were few and far between with, once again, Pitsford producing the week’s Yellow-legged Gull sightings, which were down to single adults there on 2nd and 4th.

Still statistically rare, but no longer the pulse-raiser it once was, the report of a Glossy Ibis at Summer Leys on 31st passed without event, although at Bittern there on the same day was solidly caught on camera. Another Bittern was present at Thrapston GP’s Titchmarsh NR early on the same date.

The week’s only Cattle Egret was again at Stanwick GP on 5th.

And the reservoirs laid claim to the period’s Ospreys, with single birds at Pitsford on 31st and 3rd, Stanford on 4th and 6th and a blue-ringed (3AY) six-year-old male – clocked earlier in the year at Summer Leys and Hollowell – visited the latter site again, also on 6th.

Passerines this week were limited to Crossbills being heard at Pitsford on 2nd and over Irthlingborough on 4th.