20th January - Implacable Road, Lee-on-the Solent, Hampshire

After the gloom of Monday today started cloudy and wet, but just after dawn the skies began to clear and the sun arrived.  Perfect conditions to try and find one of my favourite birds, the Black Redstart.  There is an old area that used to be warehouses and workshops close to the Daedalus airport in Lee-on-the Solent.  Slowly the area is being consumed by houses, but sufficient derelict building and concrete wasteland manages to be home to Black Redstarts.  The assumption is that they breed here, but they only seem to be reported at the start of the new year and towards the end of the year.

The area is also a place where learner drivers go and there were several cars parke up when I arrived in Implacable Road, just of the Daedalus Drive.  The area is also close to the hovercraft museum, which with old machines and parts helps preserve the Black Redstarts habitat.

I walked up and down the road to start with checking all the roofs of the adjacent buildings.  In Europe Black Redstarts like the high cliffs and rocky area.  They appeared in Britain after World War II and occupied the old bomb sites around London and other industrial targets of the Luftwaffe.  Old disused buildings and concrete seem to be the favourites and they like to sing and protect their territories from the roofs.  When I used to visit the Linde works in Museum I used to see them there on the tall buildings and around the railways station.

Initially I was having much success there was though a bonus in a Raven that flew over and then out of sight.  A little further along the road and the Raven appeared almost over my head.

It flew low over me and then circled around and back out of sight.

I then heard the Raven "Gronking" and it showed again this time being mobbed by a Carrion Crow.

People often make the mistake of thinking a crow is a Raven, when in fact there is a considerable size difference in the overall sizes of the two birds and the size of their beaks.  This was a unique opportunity to capture them side by side.

The Raven was chased away and I made my way back towards the car.  As I did so I noticed a small bird on the roof of the old building.  There was the Black Redstart and I was in luck it was a male bird.

It stayed on the apex and would bob and flick the res tail that gives the bird its name.

Running along the slates pecking at the moss for insects.

But the favourite place was the eave.

The first real views of the red tail that contrasts so well with the all black and grey plumage.

There is a pale greyish white panel in the tertiary and secondary feathers that provides the sheen of the bird and for me sets in apart.

It dropped to the ground and then up on to a wall, fortunately with the sun behind me and with a stunning background.

It stayed on the wall moving back and forth.

But eventually dropped from view and I decided that I had seen and enjoyed enough.  So I made my way back to the car, negotiated the learner drivers and headed off to my next stop for the day.