RARITY PREDICTOR

Each month, we take a left field guess at predicting which radical rarities will turn up in the country during the month. Here are our semi-educated stabs in the dark for July.

HUDSONIAN GODWIT

In late July 2015, a Hudsonian Godwit was found at Ballyconneely, Co. Galway, Ireland. The same bird was still in the county in September. Who knows, we may have a midsummer visit from one of these North American megagodwits in the UK this year. Thats said, there have only been three accepted records of Hudsonian Godwit in the UK, the last being a female which stayed for a week or so at Meare Heath, Somerset in spring, 2015 (see inset photograph).

LITTLE SWIFT

There have been just 25 accepted Little Swifts in the UK. Many of these birds have been in the last week of June or July. Little Swifts can turn up just about anywhere. For instance, in 2001, there was one at Netherfield Lagoons, Nottinghamshire. The last summer records were in late June at New Brighton, Wirral, Merseyside in 2012 and at Spurn, East Yorkshire, in late June and early July 2008.

LESSER CRESTED TERN

Only nine records of Lesser Crested Tern have been accepted in the UK. Birds have been found lingering, especially associated with Sandwich Tern colonies. Most famously, one turned up on the Farne Islands, Northumberland, in 1984, with presumably the same bird returning until 1997; where it even succeeded in pairing up with a male Sandwich Tern and raising hybrid offspring. July is as good a month as any to look for them.