Welcome to my birding blog - first launched 12th March 2012...
29th August - 1st September
I'll be brief...
August 29th: Staveley YWT in the afternoon
Hobby and merlin reported so I decided to give it a go. Public hide enabled me to watch a few dragonflies from quite close and without disturbing them. Here's a migrant hawker - in flight!
Next came the merlin: distant view as it perched for some time in a willow. [Hobby not seen]
Terrifying noise as this came low over the reserve. I wondered if it was about to crash land but it seemed to make it!
Common terns were feeding over the main lake.
I walked to the newer section of the reserve. Storm ahead: by now the light was very poor. Feeling Jurassic?
August 30th: Bempton
By the time I arrived the greenish warbler that had performed well was proving more elusive. I was pleased to get these less than perfect images given how hard it seemed to see the bird at all. The wing bar is diagnostic.
A good year tick!
August 31st Sheila and I ended up [after a family visit in Pontefract] at Humberston Fitties to see a white-rumped sandpiper. Duly seen in my scope but too far for a photo. Probably only my second or third ever, so another excellent year tick.
September 1st: Saltholme
Phil Stead hide for 3 pectoral sandpipers. Two in the first two photos.
Breast band shows well here.
252 UK 2017 - Autumn is starting to happen!
24th-27th August 2017
Newburn Bridge
24th August
Fairly high tide. Oystercatchers and sanderlings put on a show.
Some ringed plover dropped in.
I had been down on the black sand to take my photos. Coming back up the ramp to the promenade I noticed something twitch in a wild buddleia that was managing to survive growing in the rock armour. I waited. This willow warbler put on a stunning display at close range.
Seaton Common and Seaton Snook
26th August
Back to the north-east. I walked the common from the Zinc Works Road to the golf club clubhouse end and back. One whinchat, seven stonechats and two wheatear seen plus supporting cast of swallows, kestrel, gulls.
This young skylark ran along in front of me sticking to the shady side of the track until eventually it ventured into better light. Click!
Wheatear
I then went out onto the Snook. Lots of terns way out on their roost and I spent some time looking through them with the scope. Here's a few pictures.
Blacktoft Sands
28th August
I went to Blacktoft with the particular wish to get some good photos of green sandpiper. As it turned out they were never as close as I've had them in the past but overall I came away quite happy.
250 UK 2017
19th-23rd August 2017
The Colour Purple
Before we get to the purple bit I took Sheila on Saturday 19/8 to Helmsley to see some owls. We just took Sheila's Canon with a modest zoom lens and set on automatic. Here are some of the shots...
Steller's sea eagle
Yellow-billed kite [if my memory serves me well!]
Griffon vulture
Snowy owl
Common buzzard
Flight shots of a race of eagle owl
Barn owl
Harris hawk
These place certainly provide a good opportunity to practice flight shots with several flight sessions per day with a variety of birds. On our visit the eagle owl was relatively easy to photograph, the barn owl was faster in flight, the buzzard flew into a tree and refused to co-operate [!] and the lanner falcon was impossible without a big lens as it flew out a long way at incredible speed.
Back to the real thing - wild birds!
Next day we went up to Silverdale to try to photograph the purple heron at Leighton Moss. The Grizedale hide was packed but we waited and stared at a patch of thistles and I got really frustrated as people said they could see the bird's head and I couldn't see anything even though I knew I was looking in the precise place!! Some black-tailed godwits dropped in.
After an hour or so we were promoted to the front row as people left either in exasperation or to get lunch. We stayed on. After about two and a half hours the heron walked into full view.
So here it is.
Monday 21st August: a trip up to Saltholme area hoping for whinchat and maybe a roseate tern. Neither seen. Phil Stead hide was quiet and the reserve wasn't yet open. I drove slowly down the Zinc Works road. Plenty of young stonechats [about 15 stonechats seen!] but no whinchat.
The dell at the end of the road held a good range of butterflies: painted lady, whites, peacock and these...
Common blue; small copper; red admiral; wall
Out at Seaton Snook there were plenty of sandwich and common tern. The light was difficult. I approached the birds carefully but a couple with a dog scared everything off. I did snap this young kittiwake on the water's edge.
A very nervous wheatear [my first autumn sighting this year] lingered along the fence line behind the dunes.
248 UK 2017
6th-18th August
August sleeps!
I am still here and pottering about in Yorkshire! Not much cooking, really. Anyway, here's my latest report.
August 6th: St. Aidan's
Little owls tempt us back to St. Aidan's.
August 9th: Blacktoft
Very quiet, just somewhere to go. One of the few occasions [the second ever, I think] that I didn't see a marsh harrier. Little egrets still impress even though we take them for granted now.
Sitting in Marshland, after about 20 minutes I spotted some...well, can you see them?
Yes, snipe.
August 13th: in the garden and St. Aidan's again!
What is this? Any suggestions welcome. It may be some sort of hawk moth but I can't find a caterpillar photo to match. Spotted by Sheila on the edge of a compost bin!
It was actually rather small!
In the afternoon we went to St. Aidan's - my third attempt to see the clouded yellow butterfly that had been reported a few times. Previous visits were either windy or a bit cold. This time we struck lucky: lifer butterfly for me. We walked from Oddball to the Astley Lake causeway to spot it but, thanks to another visitor who encouraged us to keep going, we caught up with it as I suddenly saw it drop down quite near us. [He had a bike!!]
Hand-held 500mm lens - it works for me. I find quite a few insects don't let you near enough to use the macro lens.
The little owls [2 seen] performed well for us - much to Sheila's delight.
August 15th: Saltholme
Deadly quiet there too and the white-rumped sandpiper flew off about 40 minutes before I arrived. So instead here's more snipe and more egret!
August 18th: Nosterfield
A little stint was reported at Nosterfield a couple of days previously. Then, yesterday, great excitement as it was decided it was either a western sandpiper or a semipalmated. I got up early but not as early as Alan Whitehead who trekked it from Holmpton near Spurn to spot it. However by lunchtime it had been decided [from photos] it was a little stint after all. Not even a year tick. Sad face...but that's birding. If we saw what we hoped to see every time it would all be pretty pointless, wouldn't it?
Anyway, here it is. Distant record shot of the former semipalmated sandpiper then western sandpiper and, ultimately little stint! Still a pretty bird.
Stuck on 247 UK 2017
27th July 2017
Spotshanks & Spoonbills!
-well-known birders' expression of utter amazement when finding a really rare bird...
This particular trip made little sense geographically as I drove over the Humber Bridge to Alkborough, then back east again to Far Ings, then back west to Blacktoft. The order of events being dictated by the birds not by sensible route planning.
So, I'll start at Alkborough Flats. No sign in the strong breeze of any bearded tits. Plenty of young reed buntings about.
A drake common scoter was distantly in front of the hide.
Some spotted redshanks were quite close.
Spoonbills too. With a bill like that you sometimes need a mate to help you preen the bits you can't reach!
A juvenile white-winged black tern was showing at Far Ings. On the Pursuit Pit. Persistently a long way away too. Still it was a challenge to get these images.
Had enough? Yes - couldn't hold the camera steady any longer. Perhaps I should use a tripod...but don't really want to...
I headed west for Blacktoft Sands. I headed for Marshland hide for the waders. As I entered the hide I immediately spotted a group of roe deer off to the left. Quickly swinging into action I took some nice photos.
They soon galloped off and melted away into the reedbed.
There were plenty of spotted redshanks here too. Alkborough and Blacktoft share the same species pretty much.
Spotshanks and spoonbills here too!
I've even designed my own spoonbill wallpaper...
I sometimes wish the marsh harriers came closer at Blacktoft but, to be fair, they are even more distant at Alkborough. Here's a few Blacktoft views. All the images are the right way up - one bird did some aerobatics as you can see!
Twisting and turning.
My favourite images from Blacktoft were, unusually, of ruff...
...and in particular of this bird from Townend.
I'll finish with a few other birds: black-tailed godwit.
Heron.
Something rather nice, I thought: little little grebes!
Since then I've had a quick morning trip to Saltholme for egyptian geese. Four seen but scope only views.