Four members met at the Druid’s Inn for an evening meal – David, Alexander, Ann and me. We met two more at the Rainbow afterwards (father and son from Chester, new members, can’t recall your names, sorry.)
Regrettably, despite a long wait into the dusk on the forest path, we neither heard nor saw a Nightjar, although David was sure the black bird which we caught a fleeting glimpse of as we arrived, disappearing into shrubbery by the path, was a Nightjar we had disturbed. David has heard Nightjars at this location on at least three occasions in the past, but not tonight !
We had more luck with bats on the way back to the car park at 10pm. My bat detector easily picked up the small bats flitting at head height through the tunnels of trees. They were calling at about 45KHz so were almost certainly Common Pipistrelles. We also picked up something at 20 KHz, which ought to have been a Noctule, but we couldn’t see anything flying higher up. Nothing at 80 KHz +, which would have been Greater and Lesser Horseshoe bats.