The Local Patch (5Km) Birdlist
I have now updated the Local Patch birdlist, covering the period up until the end of 2024, which appears in the table below. Firstly though, I should explain a bit about the birds that actually appear on this list. In the case of scarce or rare birds, all records used have been adjudicated and accepted by the relevant rarities committee (BBRC or SOS/SOSRC - see abbreviations page for explanation if uncertain), and whilst there may be a few valid claims for some species either not submitted or verified by these committees, for the sake of credibility these have been discounted. It would be fair to say then that the figures I quote would be the minimum number of species occurring.
The 5Km area covers the parish of Middleton-on-Sea (M-o-S), but also the Felpham, Shripney and Lidsey areas of Bognor Regis to the west, the Barnham area to the north and the Climping Gap and edge of Ford and Littlehampton to the east. In the case of M-o-S, I have researched records from the SOS archives in recent times and supplemented them with my own observations and this largely applies also to Shripney and Lidsey, but the Barnham area proved far less straightforward. I should also state here that the Climping Gap is an important site in its own right; largely still undeveloped and with some good areas of habitat, it has produced a whole host of scarce and rare species over the years and has a history of being regularly watched by a number of competent local birders. I hope I can include myself in the latter category as I've watched at the Gap on and off since the late 1970's.
One of the stalwarts from those earlier times is Bola Akinola and he is still the driving force there to this day, also running a separate blog detailing sightings at that site. I thoroughly recommend a visit to his blog 'The Birds of Climping Gap & Lower Arun Valley'. I continue to be grateful to Bola for showing me some of the rarer birds he's found at Climping, and for the bird list on his blog, for all those species previously recorded form a large part of my own all-time 5 Km area list. They are not the whole story though, with other areas in more recent times adding to the list.
So, moving onto the list itself, it might be in order to clarify things and help readers interpret the colour coding shown on the table below. The first (pink) column left (marked ALL) shows the overall total of 276 species, this being the all-time total from all observer sightings. Each species is marked '1' but in several cases you will notice that a '0' appears....the reason is that this indicates a sub-species (i.e. not a full species in it's own right) that has been seen, but it does not score when calculating totals. The second column, (headed ME), lists the species I have personally recorded since I first watched the area, the total being 237, almost 86% of the overall total. Next we come to the list of species and here you will notice that all the species I've seen are highlighted in bold type, with either a blue or green background....if it's green I've recorded the species since the year 2000, whereas if it's blue I've recorded it before that year but not since (yet, anyway!) One species - Balearic Shearwater - is highlighted in red, this being my most recent addition to the list (Sept 2024) and a new bird for the patch.
If you're still with me, look to the right and you will see annual yearlists from 2024 down to 2020, with totals ranging from 165 down to 145, and on the extreme right, the green column shows the total number of species seen by me since the year 2020 - the total of which currently stands at exactly 200. Hopefully, these totals will continue to increase as time goes on. (updated March 2025)
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