20:05hrs Final rapid entry with birds dropping like stones into the reedbed, continued to 20:06hrs with only a few still out thereafter, though 100+ flushed out by a duck c. 20:10hrs [12/12]

20:03hrs Sparrowhawk finally departed towards NE pursued by mobbing Swallows, now perhaps only 2-3k birds remaining in high cloud [11/12]

20:00hrs Birds twisting and turning low over reedbed, some still bouncing and circling round again [10/12]

19:59hrs Further views of clouds of birds before main entry started [9/10]

19:59hrs Huge clouds of birds again in every direction [8/10]

19:58hrs Approaching roost again suggestions of in excess of 10k birds [7/10]

19:57hrs Still an absolutely enormous cloud of Swallows up, looking east and beyond end of tanks [6/10]

19:56hrs Swallows now approaching reeds but most not entering, "bouncing", but possibly first entries [5/10]

19:54hrs Sparrowhawks both chasing into and low over reedbed, male then female, perhaps assisting count by keeping birds out of the roost for longer, though 16 mins after sunset still quite early [4/10]

ad f Sparrowhawk on fence joined by a second bird; ad m Sparrowhawk seen later on track by reedbed so likely a pair despite lack of obvious size difference [3/10]

At 19:48hrs up to 5k Swallows, sample counts for age breakdown based on obvious long tail streamers on ad m (9 in 111), suggests the vast majority of birds c. 85% are juveniles [2/10]

c. 300 birds had arrived by sunset 19:38hrs, some Pied Wags dropped into roost; first video here 19:46hrs when up to c. 3k Swallows, Sand Martin also heard but very few, and Sparrowhawk perched on fence lying in wait [1/10]

Last video...

The mega Blindwells hirundine roost has now completely transformed from >99% Sand Martin to >99% Swallow, approx numbers in the 6-7k range on last three evenings, with attention from local Sparrowhawk and an all white Swallow seen, poss from further south*...

* bsky.app/.../lothianr...

Tucked in, then briefly awoke, I had to leave... [6/6]

Settling on Long Craigs [5/6]