What can I say....

Sitting in the office, at work this morning, complaining about the dismal service provided by our IT section, gazing out of the window at a grey rainy day when the phone rings.

I glance down and see who its from. Gary Woodburn. Now this provokes some interest from my sapping miserable person, as when Gary calls it usually means he's seen something interesting. Wondering what it could be, I answer and Gary asks where I am. I tell him then comes the punchline. 'I've just found a Lesser Grey Shrike at the Long Nanny' he says.

To go from being morose to being kicked up the rear into action took about ten seconds of silence. I couldn't speak. Gary even asked if I was still there! Oh yes, I was still here but my mind was racing. This was a British lifer for me and was only 7 miles from my house but I was 25 miles away at work. Nothing for it, get a half day flexi booked in and off I went...

Straight home in torrential rain, get changed from the shiny shoes and tie into waterproofs, let Bunty into the garden and back out up to the 'Nanny where a few of the lads had the target staked out.



Above - Shrike site. Click on it and the bird can be seen as a white dot five fence posts from the right...



Above - Does anyone work!



Above - Imagine walking through the dunes and lifting your bins to this...



Above - Reed Bunting doesn't like it...



Above - Its off...


The bird was very bedraggled at first but soon perked up when there was a short easing up of the rain and even began to sing quietly to itself. We watched him ( at first I thought it was a female due to the broken grey black forehead until the singing started, I now think it was probably a fs male) down to 30 yards in the open for over an hour before the rain got the better of us.

All the features required could be seen easily. Grey mantle, nape and crown, black mask and forehead, white throat contrasting strongly with the blush pink underparts. It was very long winged with a huge white flash at the primary bases.







What a bird. My second lifer in under a week ( I've seen several in Turkey, Hungary and Slovakia but they're just holiday birds, they dont count!).

British List 388
Northumberland List 318