Saturday 17th May 2014
	High pressure today produced sightings of several mobile rarities, with brief encounters with Red-footed Falcon in Essex, Suffolk and the Isles of Scilly, Bee-eaters in Kent, Pembrokeshire (3) and Suffolk, Red-rumped Swallow in Cornwall and Leicestershire, and Black Kite in Cornwall, Hampshire and Suffolk. Rarities elsewhere comprised two Black-winged Stilts together in West Sussex at Bracklesham, a Lesser Yellowlegs on the Western Isles on South Uist, Two-barred Crossbill still in Norfolk, King Eider in Aberdeenshire, and both Caspian Stonechat and Western Subalpine Warbler on Fair Isle. Scarcities included nine Temminck's Stints, six migrant Dotterel, four Glossy Ibises, two each of White-winged Black Tern (together in Greater Manchester), Golden Oriole, American Wigeon, Surf Scoter and Cattle Egret, and single Ortolan Bunting (Cornwall), Wryneck (Shetland Isles), Buff-breasted Sandpiper and Pectoral Sandpiper (both Orkney Isles).
-  Chris Batty, RBA