Gone Birding

Dispite Dave N having a brilliant day at Carsi today with Bewick's, Grey Plover and the GNDiver amongst other things my usual afternoon roost visit produced a more run of the mill day. With all the gulls being flushed off Flat Island by a low flying Buzzard just before I reached PSHide I only paid a brief visit there, which produced 4 Shelduck, the female Pintail again and a drake Shoveler on the far side of the reservoir. There were still 5 or so Goldeneye here to with a smashing drake displaying occasionally.

As Alan E was in the hide and wanted the RBGull for his year list we went up to Lane Ends to find a very disjointed roost with few large gulls to start with. There were still large numbers of Common's in though with, at a guess, 200 visable. Just 5 Herrings were present with a single YLGull (presumably the resident bird which apparantly has taken 2 Little Grebes in the last few days and I have seen it have determined goes at Coot (possibly getting one), indeed it seems to patrol above the groups of feeding coot on the shorelines in the day!). After a while I found the RBGull and we enjoyed reasonable views before it flew further out. Birds of most note were probably the 2 adult Greater Black backs....as far as I know the highest number so far this autumns roosts! Even at dusk the LBB numbers seemed down and I estimated 1-1500 were present, down on the 2500 and more of most nights, could the cold snap of the last few days have started their southward movement? Then again numbers could be back up tomorrow!! Black headed seemed still at good numbers with loads all over the reservoir (maybe 4000+).

I still haven't caught up with our 4th GNDiver of the autumn yet, apparantly this time its an adult winter with just a few retained summer mantle feathers etc...... Hopefully one will stop for the winter?

A quick trip up to the res' produced a couple of good birds... the Ring billed Gull appeared briefly on Flat Island quite early today before flying off up the reservoir and vanishing.... but the big news was an Egyptian Goose outside Paul Stanley Hide... Ok so not that exciting but it is a rare bird at Carsington. I can only remember seeing one or two there before!

Egyptian Goose- Paul Stanley Hide, Carsington.

Also from Paul Stanley were the usual gull species (including a few Commons feeding in the pools on the mud in front of the hide (Oh how I wish the RBG would do that!).

Common Gull.

There was a single female Pintail and a single female Goosander to and a solitary Redshank, along with the usual Snipe and wildfowl. The pond infront was frozen so no Kingfisher!

Pintail (female).

There are a load of Bullfinches around the Reservoir including some calling very strangly...I still haven't see one of these yet to see if they look different! Also on site today was a GNDiver (the fourth of the autumn so far...but I didn't catch up with it).

Up at the roost early and into Paul Stanley hide in the hope that the "mystery gull" returned... neddless to say it didn't! But we did have excellent views of the RBG as it posed around Flat Island from 3pm alowing us to see in both in and out of the water!  The adult winter Med did the same and at one point we had Med RBG and YLG on Flat Island showing well along with a single hulking GBB adult!

Well its not often I see something I've never seen before at Carsington, but tonight we had a gull sp the likes of which I havent seen the like of. It immediately stood out as something new. An adult bird it was vaguely reminisent of a Caspian Gull in shape having a long attenuated body and rangy awkward neck etc and the head looked relatively smallish along with a longish parallel sided bill but the bird was as small as the lower end of the LBB range and had normal proportioned legs which were yellow in colour.... not the bright yellow of YLGull but having the duller green/grey tints of a alternate LBB perhaps (Paul M one of the other observers states they were bright yellow in sunlight but duller than LBB in shade.... I would put them as I say as alternate plumaged (winter) LBB, at the lower end of brightness). The mantle was too dark for a Caspian being similar in darkness to a YLG (but a different colour) or even slightly darker.... it did stand out as paler than the LBB but not like say a Herring does (of either argenteus or the darker argentatus). The bill was yellow (paler than YLGull) and had a orange reddish gonys spot (this stood out) but we due to the light couldn't really make out if there was any real black areas.... I feel there was some towards the tip area. I also feel the base had a slight greener/bluer tinge. The eye appeared dark (you culd see the pale eyes on Herring in the sunlight) and surounded by dark smudging and there was some brown grey streaking on the ear coverts (the others remarked on a dimple effect on the ear!). There was a shawl of diffuse but obvious streaks around the nape and down onto the breast sides (there is some disagreement on how to describe this with me feeling there were darker lines surrounded by diffuse colour with Paul M describing it as smudgy and diffuse!).  I think there was possiby some markings onto the upper nape and rear crown too... It didn't look as "white-headed" as YLGulls or Caspians do normally (all the YLGulls in the roost have lost most of their head streaking now). In the brief view of the wing tip it looked to have more black that a Caspian or Herring type....more like YLG (triangle of black). I did get a view of the underside of P10 and it was wrong for Caspian lacking the pale tongue and having a white mirror separated from the white tip by a complete band of black. 

We eliminated yellow legged Herring by the size shape, bill proportions and mantle shade and dark looking eye. Caspian by the wing tip pattern size and mantle shade along with the normal length/proportioned legs and the strong yellow tones of the latter. A Lesser BB that was very pale was discounted by the look and wing tip pattern and the fact it didn't look like one! Finally as mad as it sounds Common by the fact it looked like a big gull and the bill etc!

It is difficult to get across in words just how different this bird looked to our standard species. It has me stumped... It reminded me a bit of Armenian Gull when we were watching it (but with duller bare parts and paler mantle and a less Common Gull head shape), the weird thing is that both myself and Paul M have both picked out California Gull as the closest in the books, along with strangely along with for me, the far eastern forms of Caspian (Baraba Gull etc) interestingly the similarity of forms of Caspian and Californian Gull has been noted before and indeed is mentioned in Gulls!

I'm sure we will never know what it was!! Needless to say apart from the 2 YLGulls, a "new" adult Greater Black Back and a few Goldeneye including a displaying couple of drakes little else was seen due to us staring as the above gull!

Of course it was the one night I elected not to take the video and dispite taking loads of stills all I got was fuzzy blobs GRRRRRRR I did try a bit of vid through the coolpix but that had a similar result........

Late news!! I found two shots that sort of work.... both are very fuzzy and don't really convey the bird but the first shows the small size (ignore the odd leg colour as its due to the camera) and the mantle colour isn't right..... 2 shows the mantle colour better but its perhaps a tad too dark, and shows the yellow legs.... on both the bird looks odd and not as distinctive as it did in life.... the head is too small on 1, almost comically small even for a Caspian type (not sure whats going on, and in 2 it looks a bit too LBB like!!!!), but at least they prove we saw something!!

Photo 1

Photo 2.

Good night at the gull roost tonight, we were able to enjoy excellent views of the Ring billed Gull off Lane Ends in brilliant light.... interestingly this time the bird lacked the hooded look it usually has, and appeared pale headed and you could see the fine streaks on the head that form the head markings on the nape/earcoverts etc.. It looks like a totally different bird! The white tertial crescent also looks smaller and less obvious in good light and you could see the pale eye and bill details! JOY!

Also starring in the roost was the fine adult Med Gull, again in with the LBB's rather than the small stuff.....

The roost was a large one having I guess around 4000 Lessers in along with 200+ Common Gulls. There were also loads more Herrings in (inc agentatus adult) with at least 20 birds probably more. In amongst these were 4 adult YLGulls and a "new" 3rd or 4th winter bird.

Well atrocious weather again today resulting in a visit to Carsi for the roost being a bit damp! The gulls were not really playing ball with lots being arse on from Lane Ends hide, but I did manage to locate the RBGull which actually showed farly well for a while despite the awful light. We only managed a single adult YLGull too. There were loads of Commons in the roost which I had hoped to count but not a hope tonight!!

Wildfowl numbers seem down today..... less Teal Tufted and Pochard in evidence.

On the way home I got a Snipe in the headlights flying over the road just outside Hulland Ward.....

A brief entry this one for an afternoons birding.... highlights were approx 150 Fieldfare over the WLC heading south and the roost which contained an adult winter Med Gull, 4 Yellow Legged Gull adults and very late the RBGull.

Also present early on was a single 1st winter GBBGull. Herrings numbered about 7ish with one very small very pale mantled adult (Iceland almost in colour).... I'd like to see that one again!

An awesome day up at the reservoir today. The day started with a message that there was a Black Redstart on the corner of the dam wall near the Sailing Club.... this is only the second site record so off I went! Arriving I found the bird was in the Sailing Club and on the roof of the building, but the Commadore had granted us access to this normally restricted site.... After a brief wait the bird showed very well on the roof then moved off and was relocated on the dam where it fed on small flies amongst the stones. It was great to see it in amongst the grey stones that almost matched the birds plumage!

Then it was round to Sheepwash for the roost, but here the female Scaup was showing right in front of the hide but it was asleep all the time I watched it today! Also here we saw distant views of the almost completely summer plumaged Great Northern. The gulls began to roost off Lane Ends so off we went..... Richard found a new second winter YLG on the way, along with our usual bird. In Lane Ends there was a tense wait before I found the RBGull.... it showed well for a short while then flew out into the main body of the roost miles away. The female Common Scoter was off here too. Then right at the last of the light the Great Northern hove into view just a few yards off shore....what a lovely bird with the mostly summer plumage only missing around the chin and throat areas!

My video of the Black Redstart! A right pain to film as its constantly flitting around!

Well a really bad night tonight. The visability was OK to start then went rapidly downhill.... add to that that we made a tactical error in which hide we plumped for mean't nothing much was seen. The gulls began to gather on Flat Island so we went to Paul Stanley hide... here we did see a really interesting Common Gull. It was almost the size of a LBB... it dwarfed the other Common Gulls. Interestingly in flight I actually thought it may show slightly smaller mirrors than normal and a small SofP effect but the light was soooooo bad we didn't see anything on it properly!!

Ten we plumped for Sheepwash 'cause it was oersisting down and all the gulls were unviewable.........

Another good afternoon at Carsington....arrived at about 3pm for the roost to find a few people in the hide at Sheepwash only to find that the Garganey had been seen earlier to the right of the hide but due to the light we didn't relocate it, but the 3 Pintail were still present. The Common Scoter female was still out towards the middle of the reservoir and could be seen to be feeding well on something.... fresh water mussels...crayfish?? This has been here a while now hasn't it! The usual Yellow legged gull was on the spit end with the Cormorants and showed well. The roost began to form opposite Lane Ends so some of us went down there in dribs and drabs. After realising the light was bad there to we persevered and up to 3 adult Yellow legged Gulls were seen (all now getting really smart looking). Then Richard Lowe say "is there supposed to be a Great Northern Diver here?" Well there was a couple of days ago we reply...."well its over near Fishtail" was his reply! Sure enough there was a GND and its an adult showing quite a bit of summer plumage (some saw it earlier apparently and confirmed this) Thanks Richard. Then there was a while of searching the very large roost until in the gathering gloom I located the RBGull. Unfortunately it was only on view for a short time before heading out into the gloom and the main mass of gulls.....

The semi resident Yellow Legged Gull.

A trip up late afternoon to Carsington produced some excellent stuff, present in front of Sheepwash Hide were a female/imm Scaup and the female Common Scoter plus 2 drake Shoveler and the usual collection of common wildfowl. The roost was fairly large with 2000 plus LBB's and at least 2 Yellow legged Gulls (one absolute spanker was present and the usual semi resident bird.). After a while it became apparant a lot of gulls were coming in further up the reservoir so I headed to Lane Ends Hide where I found the RBG a way off in the roost but we were all able to enjoy fairly satisfactory views. Late on I spotted a wierd BHG with no real facial markings just a small area of dark around the eye.... the bird to me looked slightly paler and bigger than the birds around it, and appeared to have a different head shape....... but god knows the light was sooooooo bad!!

Heres a video grab from Saturday of the RBG.....

Well I decided to head up to Carsi this PM and when I arrived Mark Pass was already sitting looking through the gulls... I finally located the 3 Pintail that have eluded me for the last few weeks, then Mark said.... could this be the Ring billed? I looked and sure enough there was our American friend back again for its umpteenth year.... must be around 6 years now (with just one blank one when we didn't see it!  Well it showed well in the calm conditions and even lingered viewable in front of Sheepwash long enough for Martin Roome to dash from Ticknell area and just see it before the gulls moved out into the middle of the res.... the jamy so and so!

Also in the roost were up to 5 YLGulls some of which looked like new individuals....

Bit of video I took.

Oh and now I have a dilema...supposed to be going to Yorks for a 50th tomorrow and the mega's just gone of about an Eleonoras Falcon in Southend.... now thats the second time thats been in that area this week...... bugger!

Today I started to go back over some really old photo albums from the 80's and early 90's... I found quite a few shots that brought back some great memories, some are not brilliant but to me are great memoirs of a pre digital age! I have loaded some into a new gallery.

Two or three that really stick in the memory are the Nutcracker at Cocknedge Stoke on Trent on the 20th October 1991. It even sat on my camera lens!!

The American Coot was a long haul down to Kent on a hot day I remember then we camped at Minsmere in the car with Nightingales singing right next to us all night.....

The Grey tailed Tattler drew us to the far north and Burghead, here I was nearly thrown out of our hired Minibus when we were a few miles off the site for joking a Peregrine might eat it before we got there! We enjoyed great views of the bird in the cold morning along with the crowds, but we went back later in its stay and had it all to ourselves as it fed on the beach.

Finally I just love this Sabines shot from Blithfield Reservoir in Staffs!!

A quick trip up this afternoon resulted in me finding a female or immature Garganey just to the right of Sheepwash Hide amongst the Teal. Thankfully a few others were able to see it too. The long staying female Common Scoter was showing off Sheepwash amongst the good numbers of Wigeon and Pochard etc.

The semi resident YLG was on spit end and later in the roost along with another adult and a 1st winter. The latter is the first youngster I've seen in the roost for a while. A few adult and imm Herrings were present along with one bird that looks a bit Caspian like but isn't!

One strange bird was a very dark mantled (slightly pale than graellsii LBB tho') YLG type with a lot of fine head streaking and only a mirror on P10 (which were still growing....), there was black on P5. I kept coming upon it in the roost but never got really good views of it in good light as it had gone quite dull by the time I found it.

A brief visit this PM down Wyver Lane produced the usual fare.... Teal numbers seemed a bit down with 64 birds present along with 4 Wigeon, 5 S!hoveler (3 males 2 females), 47 Lapwings, 25 plus BHG and 22 Snipe.... still no Jack tho'! A single Water Rail showed very well in the corner of the pool, enabling a bit of shaky video.....

A pity was that I saw it very well about 3 times, and then just as a couple who really wanted to see it arrived it vanished. Sadly they didn't wait around long enough and strolled off up the lane...then predictably just after they got out of sight it showed again, and thats when I got the above video!!.

3 Cormorants flew through and 2 Grey Herons showed well, one catching a quite large fish..... Also of note were a single Raven heading towards Crich Lane and a nice Grey Wagtail. Jays were very vocal today!

The conservation work was o going with a few workers laying a hedge near the new scrapes and having a good fire going!

Well, we were going to go back up to South Shields to get the ECW for my husband, but there was negative news this AM so we decided to just go birding instead! However we then heard of a Cattle Egret at Carr Vale, I had only seen one previously in Derbys so we decided to call in there first. On arriving at the viewing mound we discovered the bird was feeding on a grassy bank on the far side of the reserve. We enjoyed good, if distant views of the bird along with the usual other stuff on the reserve. Sadley the Cattle Egret was viewed into the sun for all the time..... In the sunshine a few Common Darters, including a mating pair were buzzing around in the very strong wind too.... surely a "last hurrah" for the species this summer!

A couple of very enlarged record shots!

A bit of shaky video too....

We then headed out to Southwell and the campus of Brackenhurst, where we had a very pleasent stroll around the fields etc logging a good number of species and generally enjoying the sunshine!!!

Hornbeams at Brackenhurst.

Oakleaves.

Finally the autumn migration has worked its magic here on the mainland, rather than on far flung northern isles! The pager mega'd off last night late on with the news of an Eastern Crowned Warbler at South Shields in County Durham. It soon transpired that there was a story behind this sighting, apparantly a local birder photographed two Yellow-browed Warblers at Trow Quarry on the coast and uploaded a shot of one....along with a few others to Birdforum, where it was immediatly recognised as a much rarer species...indeed a first for Britain!

I debated whether to go for dawn or wait, but in the end went from here around 8.30am, and headed north, knowing the bird was showing.

3 hours later I negotiated South Shields traffic and arrived to find loads of cars parked along the seafront road.

View across the Tyne.....

I was surprised after the walk to the site, as to how small the clump of trees was, but this in no way made the bird easy as it vanished for long periods as it fed a circuit around the trees. Just after I arrived people began to line the edge of the bowl level with the tops of the Sycamores it liked feeding in.... not surprisingly it didn't come back to the tops till Franco finally got them all to move away.

What has happened to elementary field craft? Never stand on where the bird is feeding or break the skyline etc!

Crowds gathering on top of the birds favourite trees...need I say more! Note how to do it too, sit down, get below skyline etc.....

Thanks to Francos continued efforts we saw it well feeding alongside 2 Blackcaps and a Yellow-browed Warbler. The latter bird chased off the ECW on several occasions very aggressively, dispite being the smaller bird!

The bird was a distinctive, being slow moving, with "thoughtful" movements picking at insects a bit reminiscent of a Vireo. In structure etc it most resembled Arctic Warbler, being large for a Phyllosc and "spiky looking" due to a long sharp bill. It had two long supers summounted by dark, grey green crown sides surrounding a paler median crown stripe (fainter than Pallas's but still obvious (well marked YBW can approach it). The face was palish with dark grey green (like the crown sides) eye stripes, flaring slightly on the rear of the Ear coverts. The dark crown sides stopped abruptly at the nape which was distinctly grey toned... the mantle and scaps etc also had grey tones and where a duller green. This strongly contrasted with the bright green fringes to the tertials and sec's and tail feathers and rump (almost ghosting Bonelli's Warbler!). The mantle could at times seem to have ghosts of darker stripes on it...most odd.

The undersides were cold white and these contrasted with the lemon yellow undertail coverts.

A couple of record shots...

Video Grab..

My Video of the Warbler off Youtube.....

I have to say these type of warblers are the hardest to video as they are so active and mobile.... its a nightmare trying to keep up with them as the flit through the canopy, especially with the small field of view you have through the camera and scope setup!

Finally we manage to get out to the east coast to do some birding! We do like the Spurn area so decided on balance that would be the place to go. Especially as some good birds had been recorded yesterday.... Red Flanked Bluetail, and Raddes being the highlights, albeit both trapped and not seen since in the case of the Raddes and only very briefly in the case of the RFBt.

As we approached Spurn we got a message saying that a RFBt had been seen at the point so we decided to head off down there first. Here we found a small crowd of birders staring at the parade ground area. We also found that the bird had not been seen since it had been found. We did however get views of a "Nordic" Jackdaw along side a British one which made it easy to see the subtle differences in plumage, the faint pale half collar and smokey grey underparts etc.... Unfortunately it flew off just as I decided to break out the camera!

 We decided to stroll on just as someone claimed the bird quite away off towards the point.... we decided not to follow the crowd and stood for a while watching visable migration as small groups of Siskin, Starling, Redwing etc all headed south over the point and out into the wash. The calls of Skylarks floated dwn from the blue sky as they too purposely headed south. Suddenly the bird was relocated actually in the end of the Heligoland trap, and we were able to note the sailent ponts and it clung to the wire.... not the best views though of this beautiful chat, which is one of my all time favourite British vagrants. It suddenly flew towards the front opening of the trap and we all lost it. One of the Obs staff did walk the trap and caught a few Greenfinch, Dunnocks and Blackbirds etc but no RFBt! We walked on and after a breakfast at the Spurnbite cafe we worked the paths around the point area.

The A Team!!

But there wasn't much in the way of birdlife, just a Lesser Whitethroat and a single Chiff brightened the usual fare.....A couple of Swallows drifted south too. I did however have excellent views of a Stoat as it came out of the Buckthorn on to the path in front and looked at me, popped back into the scrub then came out and had another look, before headed off back into the thick scrub. For a while after you could hear Wrens, Dunnocks etc alarming as they mobbed it through the scub!

We did enjoy(?) excellent views of a massive ferry as it plowed up the Humber tho'

Birding Spurn Point!

We decided to head back down towards the Warren, where we glimpsed the Barred Warbler, and then we walked the Canal, Road Bluebell areas.... stopping at the Bluebell for the  obligitary tea break! We saw a good few birds including a fair few Redwing, Blackbirds etc....but nothing of real note. Insect highlights where Red Admiral and Common Darter.

We were just chating to a friend when one of the staff stopped next to us and said it looked like they were going to trap the RFBt, so we piled in our friends landrover and headed back out there. We found a small crowd outside the ringing room, and soon found the bird had already been caught. Apparently it looked like it had never left the trap are. This leads me to believ there may have been 2 birds out there today. This bird was definately a different one to yesterdays as it didn't have a ring on, something I had suspected when we had seen it earlier.

The bird was shown to the birders and released.

I don't really know what to think about his, it was nice to see the bird like this but the unruly scrum which ensued as birders tryed to get shots of it and all the flashes going off makes me wonder about stress levels to the bird. Yes I admit I did take a couple of shots but I was standing well back and with no flash.........I wonder on occasions like this if they should get people to stand back and just use their bins to see the bird, and take photo's from a distance? or just walk down the line of birders with the bird..... this was the way I saw it done with a Raddes at Filey a while back......

Red Flanked Bluetail.

A quick trip down to Wyver didn't produce the hoped for Jack Snipe Dave N had earlier in the week, but there was 26 Snipe all feeding out in the open, along with 2 plus Water Rails (very vocal), 90 Teal, 3 Shoveler, 4 Wigeon, 10 plus BHG and Lapwings and a single Grey Heron....

The work progresses on the top pool and looks very interesting!

Grey Heron.

Autumn Colours.

A trip up produced the usual stuff. The roost contained 4 or so adult YLGulls, and a superb adult winter Med Gull. 

Earlier in the afternoon a single Dunlin was at the WLC as was a Kingfisher. The semi resident YLGull showed around the rafts and I got a grabbed shot of the wing pattern.... it is still growing P10.