Last week I made one of my annual pilgrimages to see Dartford Warbler. Last year I had a very successful day twitching at Frensham Common in Surrey so I decided to make the short trip there again to look for the bird that got me into birding as well as other heathland specialists. Arriving at around 9am I spent three and a half hours walking around the heath and woodlands, enjoying some superb weather, nice scenery and plenty of birds characteristic of the area including many pairs of Dartford Warblers feeding fledged young, Woodlark, Tree Pipit, Common Stonechat, Willow Warbler, Common Redstart and plenty of others.

Dartford Warbler was my main goal and it was with some delight that I saw my first one within five minutes of arrival on the heath. The first bird I saw was a very dull one, quickly followed by another and it turned out that these were juveniles; good to see that this scarce bird had fledged chicks. Over the course of the morning I came across a few more family parties and the heath seemed to contain a high density of this bird which I was happy to see as I had feared that the cold winter may have decimated their numbers, but seemingly not at this location. Shortly after seeing my first Dartford Warblers of the day I came across a singing male that came close enough for this quick photo.

Another of the species characteristic of this type of habitat is Woodlark. It did not take long for me to find a lark hiding among the vegetation but as it lifted off the ground and started to sing it was clear that this bird was a Skylark. I love the song of Skylarks but this was not what I was after, however, walking onto the sunnier side of a ridge I found a family party of 6 birds that I was able to watch alongside a similar group of Common Redstarts.

The Redstart family were the only ones I saw but I came across two more groups of Woodlark including the one I photographed carrying food to chicks in a nest; this is always a good time of the year to see birds such as these as they are busy tending young. This was also true of a pair of Common Stonechats with two fledged chicks that were loitering alongside a footpath. I noticed, from a distance, that every time someone walked along the path the adult birds would scold them and so when it was my turn to go along that way I had the camera ready.

The other bird I was expecting to see that is a feature of heathland and scattered woodland is Tree Pipit but it was a surprise to see just one of these, although he did display very well for me, repeatedly performing his song flight and perching on a dead branch nearby.

Of course there are plenty of other species to see at Frensham Common too and the woodland areas held Coal Tit, Treecreeper, Eurasian Nuthatch, Song Thrush, Mistle Thrush, Chiffchaff and Great Spotted Woodpecker.

The habitat at Frensham Common also contains some small lakes that add a lot of diversity to the birds that can be expected at the site. The fringing reeds are home to plenty of European Reed Warblers and I have found it to be a really good site to get close to these birds to get excellent views of them singing their scratchy song.

A few Reed Buntings occupy this habitat too while on the water small numbers of Common Terns nest on floating rafts placed in the lake for that very purpose. I also saw Tufted Duck, Coot, Great Crested Grebe, Mute Swan and Mallard on the water. Having enjoyed a nice morning and some interesting birds I had lunch in the car park and headed back home before the traffic on the M25 became too bad.

You can see the complete list of birds I saw here – eBird List for Frensham Common and Ponds SSSI, Surrey County, England, 22 June 2018.