Welcome to my birding blog - first launched 12th March 2012...
3rd-7th October 2016
Good stuff!
1: Getting my boots on!
October 3rd I decided to go and find me a cattle egret. The one at Burton Mere Wetlands [Wirral area] seemed the most reliable but the Marshside, Southport bird, although not reported as regularly, offered better views at times. I headed for Cheshire and Burton Mere. Lots of pinkfeet had just come in along with 4 goosanders - apparently a rare sight at Burton Mere. The cattle egret was seen within a few minutes among cattle naturally about a mile away but well seen in the scope. Satnav said it would take 67 minutes to get to Marshside for the other bird. I glanced at the pager just to check. Booted warbler [a lifer for me] Great Orme, Llandudno. An area I knew well. In fact reading the very good instructions I could picture the location. So I set off for North Wales. When I arrived and got out of Tiggy I espied a line of about 8 telescopes only a few yards away.
Here's lifer 426...
2: Curlew sand
Tuesday October 4th I headed north hoping for a rarity or two. I ended up spending a few hours photographing a curlew sandpiper in Phil Stead hide at Saltholme. A bird I had never got that close to. This bird was not especially close but the new kit performed reasonably...
...a couple of blackwits were present too...
..and what's this?
This magpie's idea of having a wash seemed to involve aggressively attacking the water!
3: One of those special days...
Thursday October 6th I set off early for Spurn and popped into Canal Scrape hide to have a coffee to set me up for a day's birding. And what a day it turned out to be. Things were soon bobbing along nicely...
...common snipe too...
...a hare was pottering among the bushes on the far side...
...and there was much local excitement when most unusually a purple sandpiper dropped in!
Mipits and wheatears were plentiful .
I wandered down to the seawatch hide. Sooty shearwater and a Cory's shearwater were my highlights accompanied by a few bonxies, an arctic and lots of red-throated divers. A few swallows were seen. After an hour a radio message tempted me down to Sammy's Point for a possible great grey shrike. People there said they could hear yellow-browed warblers in the second horse paddock but they only saw goldcrests which were everywhere. They remind me of cartoon character birds!
Some young birders reckoned they had seen a little bunting so we hung around in front of a hawthorn bush for about 40 minutes. I started to leave but a low whistle from one of the birders beckoned me back. Little bunting indeed.
[also reed bunting on right in photo above]
I set off back to the car. The great grey shrike showed in the horse paddocks but flew off low and south although it has been seen again today [8.10.16] A painted lady fluttered by. Monday 9pm BBC4 I thought...
...and yet another wheatear trotted along in front of me. The 5D SR is said to be tricky to hand hold but I'm happy enough with the 500mm lens and 1.4 converter and 1.6 crop! [Same goes for the painted lady shot]
Bempton Cliff was claiming all sorts so I left the chocolate factory and headed north. I saw the arctic warbler but didn't try for a shot due to distance. The eastern crowned warbler was more cooperative.
6 year ticks in a single day isn't bad for October!
4: Just a grebe...
Friday 8th October and I headed up onto Huntcliff, Saltburn to look for lapland buntings but failed to find any. Then I went to Scarborough harbour to look for the [probably] returning black-necked grebe which was easy to spot.
At Grindale the only buzzard I saw was a common buzzard so I wondered if the single report of a rough-leg was erroneous. At South Landing a great grey shrike showed distantly in Holmes Gut before flying off over Thornwick Camp.
254 UK 2016
24th September ff
Araneus diadematus and the Umlaut bird!
Forgot to include this fellow in my last blog. Garden spider [aka araneus diadematus] in our garden 24th September.
I had been hoping for a few days to find a gap in our family commitments to get away for a night and go to Anstruther in Fife to see the Brünnich’s Guillemot before it left. I managed it on Thursday but, unable to leave York before midday, it was 6 p.m when I arrived and the bird was hiding somewhere under the pontoons in the harbour. Eventually it came into view and I watched it for some time as it swam around, flapping its wings a few times. [Lifer 425!] By now it was fairly dark and I decided to leave photographing the bird till the morning - or more likely lunchtime when the tide would refill the harbour.
Next morning I snapped a few of the birds on the beach...
...and decided to explore the local area whilst I waited for the bird to reappear. Imagine my shock when the pager announced the bird was dead. Bird Guides later said 'the corpse had been retained'! Good job I saw it the night before...
I returned via Roseden for the rose-coloured starling which failed to show whilst I was there. That, of course, is birding. For a radically different account read Nigel Stewart's version of events at http://cliftonbirding.blogspot.co.uk/
A sparrowhawk was flying about and probably didn't help my chances!
Final break from driving at Newburn Bridge, Hartlepool. It was a very high tide - one giant wave took all the waders, me and this cormorant by surprise. I happened to point the camera at the cormorant as it broke over the short stone section of the jetty.
I soon spotted a med gull on the jetty.
The waders were nice and close but seemed not bothered by the people watching from the promenade.
The big wave was too much for the med gull. It returned to its favourite perch.
25.09.2016
An East Coast Safari
Sunday September 25th
I like to get off nice and early and so I was in Canal Scrape hide for 7.30 a.m. A jack snipe was bobbing away but very much obscured by the vegetation. While I waited and hoped he'd emerge I watched a couple of water rails. Here's one of them.
A common snipe was not far from the jack snipe and I hoped it might push the jack into view. If anything it had the opposite effect!
The jack snipe remained half-hidden...
A yellow-browed was being shown at Church Field.
As we watched the yellow-browed someone in the crowd said there was a pecker on the telegraph pole.
Kilnsea Wetlands was quiet at low tide. A ringed starling was on the wires by the car park...
...and some curlews were in the field over the road.
I headed north for Hornsea hoping for little gulls on the jetties but there were none. A few dinghies were on the water.
Wandering around Kirkholme Point a brightly-coloured dunlin flew in and landed almost at my feet on the narrow strip of mud.
The previously reported taiga bean goose was refound near North Marsh, Flamborough but only visible with a scope from Old Fall steps at the roadside.
I eventually saw it along with a small group of birders at the left hand end of a field of about 200 greylags. They took off and I managed to pick it out later at home as the geese flew off from the left with the taiga near the front.
It's heavily cropped - the third bird from the left. General view of the flock in flight...
Thornwick Pool had dunlins again. Messing with camera settings I snapped this heron.
Final stop: Bempton Cliff. Situation normal: gannets and fulmar on show...
...and tree sparrows in the car park.
244 UK 2016
22.09.16
A long walk to an invisible pond...
I spent the day in the Flamborough area, beginning at Bempton in the wind. Six yellow-browed warblers about including three together but very difficult to get a photo as they were endlessly active in the stiff breeze and tending to remain partially obscured deep inside the bushes. An elderly [?] pheasant attended.
I moved on to Thornwick Pool where 5 dunlin were present.
A friendly crow was in the car park by the fishermen's hut.
Later in Bridlington harbour I took a few shots of the everyday birds there. Turnstone with a young crab.
Redshank and herring gull.
The highlight of the day came late afternoon when a red-backed shrike was posted at Cromer Point pond. It was quite a walk from Long Nab car park.
Long Nab observation hut from near Cromer Point.
From Cromer Point I could see no sign of a pond even after scanning with my scope. It's at TA028 928 approx. I turned round to give up and go back and noticed a patch of bulrushes and reeds just west of the last contoured mound I had negotiated. I went closer...
Perched up distantly was the shrike.
11th September ff
Must be the season of the Twitch!
[aka: Let's twitch again like we did last summer!]
Never heard of John of Gaunt's reservoir near Harrogate? On the maps it's one of the Beaver Dyke reservoirs but often known by the name of the ruined castle by the western reservoir. The two reservoirs are just east of Swinsty Reservoir. I went there on Sunday 11th September to see a red-necked grebe.
A bit breezy but otherwise nice. As I walked along part of the Dales Way I met two butterflies I hadn't seen much of this year.
Wall
Small copper
Later I got reasonable views of the grebe but it never came close - so just a few record shots. First, here's the reservoir.
Off out birding! September 13th...Skinningrove, South Gare rocks and Newburn Bridge
Start with another visit to Skinningrove stonechat, rock pipit, linnet and a few other bits.
I saw on the pager that the white-winged black tern and black tern juveniles were still on South Gare rocks as the tide was coming in. I headed there as it was quite close by. The darker bird is the black tern: picture 1. Picture 2 is the white-winged. Met a problem I hadn't come across before: heat haze wobble!
We looked for roseates too with their long streamers. Alan Whitehead arrived as the tide became really high and most of the terns had left.
Newburn Bridge as I needed to call at Hartlepool Tesco! [ringed plover, sanderling and bar-tailed godwit]
13th September - messing about at home with new camera, I took these test shots.
Cyrtanthus elatus or Scarborough lily.
September 16th - back to South Gare but it was pretty quiet. Lots of mipits passing through...
...and a few stonechats.
Newburn Bridge had two med gulls and some other waders...
...but knot a lot else.
September 18th at Blacktoft.
About a mile from Blacktoft we spotted a buzzard. As I got the camera ready a group of dunlin flew west.
The buzzard sparred with a sparrowhawk.
Snipe and ruff at Blacktoft.
September 19th I went to Spurn but suffered battery failure early on: the battery on the new camera doesn't last as well as the 1D. I need to plan for that! I saw a yellow-browed warbler plus the wader spectacle at high tide at Kilnsea Wetlands including the woodsand. Spent a merry hour with Karen and Simon Spavin and watched a redstart plus a probable elusive barred warbler which in the end I didn't count. Just one image then, of a snipe.
Struggling along at 241 for this year but when I look at the draft of my photobook it's nonetheless been a good year for photos.