25th October 2023 ff
Birding down Cherry Cob Sands Road
But before that...
Newburn Bridge, Hartlepool - 25th October
Going out that day was probably not the best idea. Conditions were unpleasant. I spent a while watching the wild sea at Newburn Bridge...
...and then photographing the waders that were sheltering below the car park - eyes tight shut in many cases hoping, perhaps, that it was all just a bad dream.
Cherry Cob Sands Road - 29th October
It's a wonderful name for a quiet narrow country road leading to Stone Creek [or Stoney Creek as one sign post puts it] - a dead end that isn't quite a dead end. My target this day was to be a rough-legged buzzard together with supporting cast which included kestrel, buzzard, marsh harrier and hen harrier - a real raptor jamboree.
The rough-legged appeared while I was unpacking the camera!
The hen harriers [there were at least two] were much more distant and flew so low that getting a focus lock proved very difficult. In retrospect I should have used the 7D with a bigger lens. Goldfinches too!
November 6th: Hartlepool Marina and Harbour
Razorbills and a great northern diver in the marina
Cormorants too
Eider, slavonian grebe and a shag from the pilot pier.
November 7th: Pickering Swimming Pool and Fitness Centre!
Well, in the car park actually. But when I arrived it was a bird free zone. I decided to walk into town [about 100 yards away]. The pretty little churchyard was deserted [apparently another preferred location] so I wandered back. Off to the right were a couple of fairly new houses. A small rowan grew in the garden of the nearest house where two men were working. Then I saw them - about thirty - at the top of a tree at the town end of the car park. Waxwings!
