Catching up again…

Just a few quick pics from the last couple of weekends, hoping that the next one might involve some more birds!

Two weekends ago, both days were pretty relaxed, given plenty of nice weather and not much happening on the bird score. Saturday morning involved a spot of pre-Shetland shopping (ditch-dwelling Sibes beware, I’ve got some new wellies!) on the way up to Suffolk, where we enjoyed great views of the 1st winter Lesser Grey Shrike near Sizewell, and of a rather sickly Arctic Skua on the beach. The latter was somewhat oiled and a bit scruffy from some angles, but was at least still feeding well in the usual piratic manner.

Sunday kicked off at a pretty ungodly hour, in order for us to be at Snettisham for a big spring tide, and the resulting wader spectacular. Despite counting myself very much as a Norfolk birder, I’ve never actually enjoyed this experience before – it’s just a bit of a trek across there from the east coast. However, it’s well worth it – just the sound of thousands of Knot and Oystercatcher wheeling around and whooshing overhead is amazing. And the massed ranks of birds on the shingle over the highest part of the tide is well up there with the best wildlife sights in the country, for sure.

And then this weekend featured a brief stop at Thorpeness (highlights: Willow Emerald damselfly and a couple of Firecrests) on the way up to my sisters’ place, and then a relaxed meander around a few sites in E Norfolk on Sunday. The only notable bird here was this typically uninspiring Rose-coloured Starling – it certainly has nothing on the adult from Wells in the spring!

A chilled Rosy at the weekend

Suzanne and I headed up to see my family in Norfolk on Friday night and, with decidedly non-summery weather throughout, had a thoroughly lazy and laidback weekend – perfect! Saturday featured a trip to the pub to watch the Lions scrape home past the Wallabies (thank God they couldn’t kick…), a barbeque, and a little trip up to Wells for the rather stunning adult Rose-coloured Starling on the quay.

After checking my notes, it turns out that this is my seventh in the UK – but only the second adult bird. The first was a lifer for me, behind the Lowestoft Birds Eye factory on 18 June 1995. So, just over 18 years later, about time for another!

Dip-dippity, dip-dippity, dip-dip Dip-per!

No prizes for originality this weekend – Jono and I trod a predictable path to Thetford yesterday, for the long-staying Black-bellied Dipper. No apologies for that, though, since it was absolutely superb! Very confiding, and brilliantly charismatic. We stayed at least three hours, and I could’ve happily been there longer still.

As is usually the case with Dippers, its favoured area was shady and rather dark, so photography wasn’t easy… I might well be tempted back on a brighter day. But I’m pleased with a few of the shots, and the whole experience was a great antidote to work and stress in London.

One of the great things about this bird was the amount of behaviour you could watch, up close and personal, and attempt to capture on film (OK, disc!). It was feeding pretty voraciously on some sort of larvae (anyone know what? please comment if so), which had to be extracted from black twig-like shells, before being swiftly despatched.

And then, in quieter moments, he was… preening and stretching…

… swimming and bathing…

… yawning and blinking…

… and even singing! Ok, no photo of this – but here’s a recording from the excellent Xeno Canto archive, of a Scandinavian bird wintering near Amsterdam:

All in all – a stunning little bird, and well worth the trip. Anything I see this year will have to go some to beat it!

Any other birds this weekend? Yes, actually quite a bit! The notebook includes Long-tailed Duck (still on the Girling Res in N London – wish I could get close to that, it’s a cracker), Black Redstart, Great Northern Diver, 3 Slav Grebes and at least 4 Velvet Scoter on the Blackwater, and a typically distant and mobile Great Grey Shrike in Herts, where there was also an excellent array of old-fashioned farmland birds: Corn Buntings, Yellowhammers and Grey Partridge in abundance. If only more of the countryside was managed the same way…

Finally, this Grey Wag was rather confiding at Rowhedge near Colchester… often a companion to Dippers on picturesque breeding sites, this one was in less salubrious surroundings, around puddles on a derelict wharf!

The last few weeks…

… have been something of a rollercoaster ride, unfortunately including the last-minute cancellation of a week’s holiday on Islay for the New Year. But I’ve still been out on the patch a few times and seen some pretty good birds. (WHAT? A patch, I hear you say? Simple – the one generously allocated to me by Jono just before Christmas. I rather like it!)

Since I’ve got a bit of unexpected free time right now, here’s a quick whizz through where I’ve been and what I’ve seen, giving me the chance to sort out the photos I’ve taken along the way.

After the wonderful Hornemann’s at Aldeburgh, the notebook is empty for a couple of weeks before a quick drop-in at Queen Mother Res on 22nd December, en route from Loughton to Norfolk via Tamworth. Arriving in the rain, plenty of people seemed to be ill-equipped for the weather (denim jeans? When it’s pouring down? In December? And they say twitchers are idiots?!) and disinclined to go any distance and actually look for the bird (disconsolate random twitcher: “hmmph, must’ve gone”. Me: “not a chance – it’ll be here somewhere.”). I happily sploshed round to the other side and was nearly halfway round when some guys just in front started waving me over, having found it just feet away. Cracking views, and though I managed a bit of video on my phone, I’ve got no pics due to the camera staying dry in the car. Some well-informed folk reckon that Buffy will become a fairly regular autumn visitor in the UK before too long, and looking at the recent run of records, it wouldn’t be totally surprising.

Pre-Christmas birding was based in East Norfolk, with an afternoon out on Haddiscoe Island near St Olaves a particular highlight. With no other birders anywhere to be seen, Dad and I had stunning views of a Rough-legged Buzzard both perched and in flight, a pale Common Buzzard for comparison, a pair of Peregrine, numerous Marsh Harriers including a locally wing tagged bird, and brief, distant views of a self found Great White Egret. Excellent winter birding! I also popped in to see the returning American Wigeon at Bawburgh, diverting slightly from aChristmas present delivery route to Norwich.

Back home alone for New Year, I was out early on the first of 2013 with Prof W, heading for Dungeness pre-dawn. A shiny new notebook acquired some nice stuff on page one, including an early morning Merlin and a Crane on Walland Marsh, one of the first birds seen in the half light. Small groups of Bewick’s Swans and Tree Sparrows were good value, too. Down at Dungeness itself, the Glaucous Gull was predictably loafing near the fishing boats, and a flotilla of Smew were on the New Diggings. The highlight, though, was the ridiculous frequency of Great White Egret sightings… they just seemed to be everywhere! Conveniently, they all got together just before we left, with a group of 5 lined up on one side of the entrance track, and two more singletons concurrently on the other. Just one short of the UK record, I believe…

Moving up the coast, we popped in to Dover for some filthy county ticks for the Prof. Purple Sand and Shag were duly located, with a supporting cast of Razorbills and a Red-breasted Merganser, and the Black-throated Diver briefly appeared right next to us… nice!

A couple of pre-roost Hawfinch perching up in conifers, and (finally) a decent wader selection on the Swale completed a cracking day – the first time I’ve cracked 100+ species on January 1st.

The following Saturday, a flying visit to NW Norfolk featured charming flocks of Twite and Snow Buntings, a rather bizarre group of Grey Partridges on a barn roof, Greenshank and Spotted Redshank, three Barn Owls and at least six Hen Harriers coming in to roost. Pretty good stuff again.

Closer to home the next day, a splash of colour in Wanstead!

What a bird!!! Most escaped cagebirds do very little for me, but I’ve been wanting to see this White-cheeked Turaco for ages. It only appears rather irregularly, but when it does, there’s no problem getting close enough for photos! Unfortunately the light was pretty awful, and the above were all taken at ISO 1250. Still put an enormous grin on my face, though…

And finally (almost up to date now), I had a little jaunt around the west side of London last weekend with Nick C. Yet another Great White Egret (something of a theme in this post) showed pretty well after dawn along the picturesque Chess river valley at Chenies, along with plenty of their smaller congeners.

Continuing around the M25, we popped in to admire both Buff-bellied Pipits (now outside the reservoir), and then on to look for the re-identified Phyllosc at Moor Green Lakes. After it had been missing for a while, I did manage to relocate the Pallas’s Warbler… but irritatingly after hearing the familiar call a few times from cover on the far side of the river, the bird itself remained invisible. Several people asked what the call is like, so here it is…

… always reminds me of an old-school quiz show buzzer: “boiiinnnngggg!”. (Can’t remember which quiz, though – any offers?)

Concluding that day, we finished up at Staines Moor, with one or two Short-eared Owls and a Barn Owl (notable within the London area), a Water Pipit, and the usual noisy parakeets.

This weekend, with the forecast of more snow to fall, I might have to check some bits of the patch closer to home! Might find at least one of the following…

Sun, sea and sand

Last weekend finally saw a bit of vaguely summery weather, and a gentle stroll along the shore at Titchwell and Snettisham provided an ideal escape from London. Sanderling were photogenic as ever…

Jono, Paul and I managed a reasonable haul of other birds, including Garganey, 21 Whimbrel, a Curlew Sandpiper, a smart juv Med Gull and 8 Spoonbill, while the first Arctic Skua of the autumn harrassed terns offshore. Seawatching season starts here…

This weekend has also been all about waders: Old Hall and Cliffe RSPB reserves have given up a combined total of 6 Wood Sands, 5 Curlew Sands, and a heap of other regular passage waders. Great birding!

Red-veined Darters, Kelling Water Meadows

At last! A weekend out of the office, and a sunny one what’s more! A last-minute change of plan took Suzanne and me up to see my parents in Norfolk, where I thoroughly enjoyed plenty of time bimbling about in the sunshine (and catching up on some much-needed sleep!).

Bird highlights were a pair of Turtle Doves (alarmingly rare these days), a moulting adult Curlew Sand, and a grand total of 15 Spoonbills – the latter asleep, of course.

But trumping all of those were some cracking views of several Red-veined Darters along the track at the north end of Kelling Water Meadows. We found our first one immediately on arrival, and then had no problem getting repeat views regularly - probably ended up having seen four or five individuals, including a pair in cop. The macro lens made its first appearance of the year (!) and I managed my best shots yet of this increasingly regular vagrant.

This post sponsored by the letter ‘W’

Spot the difference:

Similar, no? One obvious conclusion for potential Woodchat Shrike finders is that you need to find a wire fence with wooden posts, on the east coast in early June!

The top bird is the first-summer female at Winterton North Dunes, which I saw with Nick late morning on Sunday. As we birded our way back home to London down the east coast, we were looking at a couple of Glossy Ibises at Minsmere when news broke of another Woodchat, this time at Walberswick, just up the road. It would’ve been rude not to go and have a look, no?

The Winterton bird is clearly a 1st-summer female (probably the most washed out I can recall seeing), given the pale orange-toned crown and nape, and the greyish mantle and scapulars. In the field, I reckoned the Walberswick bird was a 1st summer male (and it’s been reported as such elsewhere), given the much more richly toned crown – but without more reading, I’m not so sure how you’d rule out an adult female. If anyone has a definitive answer, please let me know.

Satisfied with a two-Woodchat day, and some pleasantly warm sunshine for a change, I confess to getting slightly distracted by this:

… and then, naturally, this:

… before continuing on homewards, stopping only to continue the alliterative theme with an excellent Wood Warbler at Sutton Common, near the site of last year’s Roller. It showed extremely well, calling and singing from relatively low perches.

Finally, >click here< for a recording of the bird singing. This was taken from a video on the 7D – I’m pleasantly surprised by the quality of the mic and resulting audio! Definitely worth remembering if I ever find anything good giving interesting calls…

A weekend of bits and pieces

Just a quick update and a few pics from a long weekend spent pottering around various sites in the south-east. It feels as though the spring may be fading out now, with very little being found on the coast despite my hopes for one more major rarity. Though the weather certainly doesn’t feel like June, the birding does! That said, I’ve been about a bit, and seen a reasonable amount…

Saturday morning had a slow (and somewhat fragile) start, recovering from a well-attended set of London Birders’ drinks at Tower Bridge the night before. However, the Marsh Warbler at Rainham offered a suitably straightforward place to start, and sang really well at times with a Grasshopper Warbler and Corn Bunting nearby. After spending a while there on two occasions, I’m amused by the number of people who are so desperate to see the Marsh, however badly! Apart from proving that it really is a bird, not a well-hidden tape, I can’t see what the big deal is: on a poor view (which is all you’re likely to get), you’re not going to conclusively ID it, and, let’s face it, a Marsh Warbler sounds a hell of a lot better than it looks. I really don’t understand the ‘can’t tick it if you don’t see it’ mentality with birds like this…

On a more serious note, it’s pretty sad to see that some of the ‘must see it’ brigade have ignored instructions asking people NOT to go into the vegetation, and blazed a trail in from the usual viewing area to get a few yards closer towards the bird’s favoured area. It’s all too predictable, and to be honest another good reason why these potential breeding birds could (should?) be suppressed in future. Apparently some twats have tried tape luring it up, as well. Schedule 1 mean anything to you? No, thought not…

However, returning to the bird’s glorious song, there’s a cracking recording of the Marsh Warbler >here<, recorded by Dave Smith at 1.30am a few nights ago. Enjoy!

Anyway, post-warbler, I had a wander around the reserve – or tried to, before a Red Kite interrupted me almost immediately. It headed in from the north, almost flew directly over the visitor centre and then loafed around over Crayford way for a while. I ran back through the centre to stay on it, possibly scattering a few scones and lattes in the process… The rest of the loop was far less eventful, with just the regular female Peregrine of note.

Sunday morning was pretty foul weather-wise, and I spent a couple of hours back at Rainham checking the river. In general, there was next to nothing moving – but a couple of Sandwich Terns came through a few minutes after a timely text from Dave Mo via Rich (the latter not even having seen them!)

Late that evening, news came through of an adult Rose-coloured Starling in Gillingham – not far the other side of the bridge. It had apparently been there since 1030 that morning… so much for sharing news. A call to one of the news services would’ve cost, ooh, at most five-pence. Howard was especially pleased, given that he lives less than ten minutes away (and reports everything from Rainham, to many birders’ benefit). Needless to say, there was no sign when we looked the next day, and having reached the limit of our tolerance for housing estate birding, headed down to Elmley. The weather wasn’t great (grey skies, with a cold northerly blowing), but we got off to a good start with a Quail calling immediately from the carpark – bonus! And of course, the entrance track is great for good views of breeding birds – this female Lapwing posed particularly well:

Like those at Rainham, the pools in front of the first three hides all had pretty high water levels, but hopefully this means they’ll be in good nick for the return wader passage later on. We did note ten or a dozen Black-tailed Godwits – presumably Continential limosa birders lingering through the summer, though we didn’t get good views. A couple of Short-eared Owls are also still knocking about, one showing fairly well along the seawall. That evening, after dropping Howard back home, I popped back into Rainham, where a Black Tern was showing distantly over Aveley Pools from the Serin Mound while the Marsh Warbler sang vigorously.

And that brings us on to today! I didn’t make a particularly early start, but still opted for Lakenheath and a spot of oriole-hunting. Arriving around 9am, it didn’t take me long to hear one of the males singing – but in increasingly breezy conditions, they were playing hard to get, and I didn’t get views this time. Not to worry – the birding backdrop was excellent for a few hours, as usual, with a Bittern booming and giving a couple of flypasts, heaps of Marsh Harriers and a few Hobby, all the reedbed warblers and close Cuckoos. Those who knock the RSPB would do well to visit Lakenheath at dawn in the spring…

Next stop was the nearby Weeting Heath NWT reserve. To be honest I only stopped to grab a cold drink, but having got out of the car, decided I should really have a bit of a look round! A pair of Stone Curlews were showing from the West Hide, but passerines in the pines were much more photogenic. A family party of Marsh Tits were really noisy, and one or two occasionally showed quite close.

A Spotted Flycatcher also showed more fleetingly, darting around near the approach to the West Hide.

While watching these, I got a useful tip-off from another birder, who’d been photographing a pair of Redstart at a site nearby. Following it up during a rare sunny interval, I spent a pretty relaxed half-hour sitting around out of the wind, listening to the male sing and both birds feeding – cracking stuff, far more entertaining than any of the jubilee celebrations!