Green Day, or Not

Lundy, 8th October 2018

In May 2016 I missed the opportunity to go for a Green Warbler on Unst, only the third at the time and the first 'gettable one since 1983. The other record was from Foula in 2014, but another was eventually identified on Fair Isle in summer 2017. It seems this species is becoming more frequent, or perhaps it's just better access to photos, DNA and sonograms that's finally revealing the true status of this long distance phyllosc. So news of another - again identified form photos - on Sunday 7th was not entirely out of the blue. Another bite at the cherry and in a reasonably accessible place, well at least compared to Shetland. 

 

Lundy Island, off North Devon, has an impressive rare birds CV, so it's a surprise that I've only ever been there for one bird - the famous Ancient Murrelet way back in 1990 (which I came for twice).

 

By October the regular ferry is on winter timetable, so we needed charter boats to get there on Monday. James Hanlon duly obliged and I headed south overnight with Al Orton and Stuart Brown, arriving at Ilfracombe around 8.30am.

 

Twelve of us set sail around 9.30 in the end, way behind the other two boats, but no matter there was plenty of time. the sailing was, to say the least, a little lumpy. In fact bordering on roller coaster. We held on as best we could in the cabin with the skipper and mainly laughed our way through it (others on board not so much). Instead of 2.15hrs it took 3 hours to get there, by which time we had the all too gloomy news that there was no sign of the bird.

 

By the time we arrived, via a rather hairy ladder climb due to low tide, the famous Millicombe Valley had been thoroughly scoured and the dejected faces of fellow dippers said it all. Never mind, it's all part of the game - they'll be another!

 

Birding highlights were few - a Great Northern Diver and a few common migrants were just about our lot.

Millicombe Valley. Host of many a rare bird and a rather lovely place to dip.

      

Verity, a 25m statue by Damien Hirst graces Ilfracombe Harbour. Great place to eat fish and chips before heading home. 

Back in the Alps - August 2018

Summer holiday this year was a return to Morzine in the French Alps, where the Fearns had a grand time with the McCormacks, the Wainwrights and Everetts in the lovely Chalet Belle Chery on the outskirts of town with beautiful vistas.

Walking, eating, more walking, treetop climbing, poolside action and mountain biking dominated and very chilled it was too.

Of course I saw a few birds and beasts, with the highlights being regular Golden Eagles near the chalet, plenty of Griffon Vulture activity and Lammergiers at the Col de la Colombière. My first Citril Finches away from Fair Isle were enjoyable. Commoner species kept me entertained too, with Honey Buzzard, Goshawk, Red-backed Shrike and Black Redstarts around the chalet,  and also Apline Swift, Crag Martin, Alpine Chough, Water Pipit in the area.

Despite my best efforts I again failed to locate Wallcreeper at Sixt-fer-a-Cheval, but did at least see an excellent Ibex. I heard Nutcracker a few times too, but never managed to see one this time sadly.
Chamoix seemed fairly common near the chalet, Alpine Newts were a great find by the kids in a swimming lake and there some nice butterflies too. All in all, very pleasant.

 

Summer Sizzler

It's been too long since I updated, so I'll keep this as a brief summary of the summer, which will be long remembered as a proper scorcher. The relentlessly hot weather quickly led to a parched landscape and - best of all - the lowest water levels seen on the patch for years. Ashton's rapidly disappeared to savannah status, but Neumann's became gloriously mud fringed, just like in the olden days.

 

So, instead of the summer doldrums we actually had some excellent local birding in July and August. Ok so not exactly the halcyon days of the 80s and 90s, but uncharacteristically rewarding for the time of year and most enjoyable too. Highlights as follows:

 

Great Egret - one in early July lingered for weeks, favouring the northern end of NF and giving wonderful views at times. A second was apparently present a couple of times, although I didn't see two birds.

 

Little Egret - up to three birds pretty much constantly present through the summer.

 

 Garganey - Greg found an adult female on 18th July which began a series of records, with this bird lingering for weeks before being joined by two juveniles on 2/08. Finally, I found an adult male on 25/08 which also lingered for a couple of weeks.

 Barn Owl - ok not related to the hot summer but a highlight to confirm breeding in the DHM box. Two juveniles were rung on 25/07, assisted by my kids :)

Black Tern - one on 26/07 found by Mark, then I found one on the Mere on 28/08. Two more were seen by others in early September and yet another in late September, so a good run.

 

Greenshank - 2-3 birds daily in late August and early September.

 

Wood Sandpiper - one found on 06/09 (a good day locally!) lingered for a couple of weeks.

 

 

Spotted Redshank - my first on the patch in a very long time was present all day on 05/09.

 

 

 

Ruff - one appeared on 12/09 and lingered until month's end.

 

Golden Plover - one with the lapwing flock on 22/09. Surprising how scarce this species now is on patch.

 

Little Stint - not quite as rare as the previous days' spot'shank, but a great find by Luke on 06/09. It lingered for several days and showed very well at times. Lovely bird.

 

Curlew - the summer roost built up to around 75 birds at it's peak. Whilst that is doubtless an important number locally, at the same time in the 90s flocks of 800 were not uncommon. I tried multiple times to see if there were any juveniles and could only ever find a single bird. Surely we're not going to let these wonderful birds disappear?

 

 

Other Waders - in keeping with local and national numbers, common waders were worryingly scarce. the number of Dunlin never rose above 5. Add the two Ringed Plover and a single Little Ringed Plover which lingered for weeks and that's about your lot. Serious declines surely - sad times.

Winchat - one on Ashton's on 05/09.

 

Water Rail - whilst resident and an annual breeder, the views from Pods Hide of adults and juveniles were excellent this year.

 

Others also recorded Marsh Harrier, Hobby, Osprey, Willow Tit, Little Gull, Ruddy Shelduck, Med Gull, Turnstone, Redstart, Tree Pipit and Wheatear over July to September.  

 

The low levels also allowed us to get a working party together to remove encroaching vegetation. Stilt island is rarely accessible, so this was the main focus and we cleared the island almost completely. Hopefully that will ensure it's continued use by breeding birds for a little longer. Being honest, though, a comprehensive management effort is needed and I'm keen to get involved if I can. Lots of ideas, lots of talk, too little time...

England Omen?

The World Cup continues to dominate, with England getting past Colombia on penalties earlier in the week, taking us to a quarter final against Sweden later this afternoon. Optimism is in the air this morning, amd so news of a Great Egret on Neumann’s encouraged an early morning patch twitch. I’ve only seem one on patch before, despite their near constant presence at Sandbach and being more or less annual on patch with brief stayers. This morning’s bird, found by Dave Hughston, was the second of the year after a brief spring bird on Ashton’s, so a welcome patch year tick for me as I joined a small band of locals in Pod’s hide in the glorious sunshine. The water levels continue to drop as the incredible summer continues. There are some puzzling arrivals on the flashes, with 3 Pochard and half a dozen Wigeon unseasonal. Waders, too, are already moving with 30 Black-tailed Godwits and 3 Little Ringed Plovers with the usual post breeding gathering of Lapwings.

 

 

Autumn Already 3rd July 2018

The long hot summer continues. It's been hot and dry for a couple of months now and the land is parched. Many birds seem to be having a good breeding season. The chilled evenings in the sunshine have been great, not to mention a thoroughly entertaining world cup (England are still in as I write this, but that may change against Colombia this evening). There's nothing quote like a fine British summer.

 

Birding has - predictably - been on the back burner, but the fierce sun is rapidly drying out Neumann's and Ashton's and so both look great for some early wader passage and that has proven to be the case with reports of multiple Green Sandpipers, Greenshank and so in the last few days.

 

With that in mind, a quick visit at lunchtime today was in order and duly rewarded - two breeding male Ruffs, 2 Black-tailed Godwits, a Green Sandpiper, two Redshanks and around 30 Lapwing graced Neumann's, as did a single Common Tern. Reed warblers still chugged away in the reeds, but the various ducks were now well into moult.

 

It's beginning to feel a lot like autumn....

How Not to Twitch, aka a right Royal Balls Up. 20th June 2018

I'll keep this short. On the evening of Wednesday 19th June news came through that the very long staying Channel Islands American Royal Tern had finally crossed into England and was roosting on the tern island in Pagham Harbour, Sussex, and present until dusk.

 

A simple plan was hatched an so I drove overnight with Mark Sutton, Al Orton and Malc Curtin to be there before dawn. Everyone knows terns head out to feed early so a pre-dawn arrival was paramount.

 

Sadly we cocked it up, setting the satnav with the postcode, this took us to the wrong side of the harbour and necessitated a 15 mile / 20 minute retrace of our steps. In those valuable minutes it got light enough to see, the bird was showing initially but as predicted rapidly pissed-off out to sea minutes before our arrival. We hung around until lunchtime but predictably it didn't return, in fact that evening it was seen 75 miles further west  in Dorset.

 

The Little Terns, Med gulls and so on did nothing to help lighten the mood. At least for me this was only an upgrade, having seen the Gwynedd Royal Tern in 2009. As such the twitch was a pre-empt of a potential future split where American and African Royal Terns will be classified as distinct. The 2009 bird was widely considered to be African, but in all likelihood will probably never be fully assigned.

 

As this year's bird has been around Guernsey since February 2017, so there's perhaps chance it will reappear yet.

 

Only ourselves to blame. Amateurs.

Double Blakeney - 2nd & 3rd June 2018

Some birds are simply more inspiring than others, and I have a tendency to remain relatively unenthused about splits; of course they all count for us OCD listers, so it makes no sense to distinguish between a stunner and a split. But in reality excitement is also part of the twitching buzz, or at least it should be, so for me splits tend to feel more of a functional tick to sate that OCD and keep moving upwards rather than the best twitches which are genuinely exciting avian adventures.

 

So last Wednesday (30th May) when news of a Moltoni's Warbler came through from John O'Groats it barely registered. A lack of enthusiasm coupled with an impending minor elbow operation meant I ruled out going immediately, although secretly acknowledging that if it stayed I would inevitably crack at the first opportunity. Moltoni's Warbler was until recently a sub-species of Subalpine Warbler, recently raised to full species status. Spring males are identifiable on subtle plumage characteristics, but best confirmed on call. All other ages require calls or DNA to identify. So on paper, for the moment at least, it remains a truly rare bird here. The stats are almost certainly a reflection of fledgling status and difficulty of identification though - Moltoni's are very likely to be annual at the very least. 

 

I consoled myself that there would soon be another as the Scottish bird had departed on Thursday, had my op and settled in for a pleasant weekend with the kids (Han Solo movie anyone?). I saw Malc Curtin Thursday morning at the patch (where a Grasshopper Warbler reeled on Ashton's) and he joked there would soon be one on Blakeney Point in Norfolk. That turned out to be an uncannily accurate prediction, as it proved to be exactly the case on Saturday 2nd June, with news breaking at lunchtime of a singing and (crucially) calling male. Social plans were shelved and travel plans immediately hatched. I couldn't drive from the op, so arranged to be collected by Mark Sutton (thanks Mark) who was travelling from Anglesey, and we were joined by Malc and Mark Payne.

 

The journey across was easy enough, but time was against us as we started the long slog up the infamously gruelling 3 mile shingle headland that is Blakeney Point. In reality it wasn't too bad, just long, and we arrived hot and sweaty by largely untroubled. Terns entertained along the way, with Little, Common and Sandwich all constantly present. A female Common Scoter flew past and a few Avocet nests on the shingle surprised us, but we never really broke stride to look, arriving at 7.20pm. The bird had been extremely elusive, as most of the departing birders had informed us along the walk up, but had shown briefly just 10 minutes beforehand. We waited. We pished. We tried to persuade it to show. Nothing, not even a call. Was it really still in there?

 

Darkness was coming and hope rapidly faded, leaving us with the unwelcome prospect of an  overnight stay, no food or accommodation and a return walk out tomorrow in the unlikely event the bird remained. And that was after the long walk back in the gloom. Not the most appealing of prospects overall. Thankfully after a couple of calls John and Jane Gregory kindly offered us their Stiffkey house (they were in Scotland), so we had digs. We'd missed any hope of food, but the pub supplied cheese and biscuits and a few pints. Things were looking up as I passed out in a comfy bed. Our plan was to wait on news before heading back to the Point. That news was surprisingly quick to come in the morning, but largely unfed since yesterday lunchtime we opted to wait for a café in Wells to open and feast before driving back to get a one way boat out at 10.30 and so requiring just a one way walk back. Middle aged tart birders. As we drove through Morston I speculatively called 'Beans Boats' and was told they had a boat out going in the next few minutes, with a return boat at 12.30. Happy bloody day. We were aboard the boat in minutes for the pleasantly brief crossing.

 

The Moltoni's Warbler showed well quickly after we arrived, although a scope was required to see it well. It was initially very mobile skipping between patches of vegetation, and appeared to have left at one point, only to eventually return to it's original spot as birds so often do. Job done and the sun shone. Aside from the Moltoni's, only a migrant Reed Warbler and resident Linnets and Skylarks were noted on the point, with the odd overflying Marsh Harrier and a few common waders. We got the 12.30 boat off and set off on the relaxed drive home, arriving at 5pm. A twitch that was definitely more about the journey than it was the bird, but they all count.

 

My classic record shots

Photo by the finder Dave Andrews @ipterodrama

 

Steve Gantlett's shot @CleyBirds