Winter Birding

 Its about the time of year to start having a think about plans for the coming one, 2024. 

So far I have no fixed ideas, as is usual, so I read as much as possible from books, blogs, social media etc to try and get some juices flowing.  It can be difficult in early winter, in the aftermath of our busiest season to get fired up.

Yesterday Andy Mould, a good Northumberland birder and stalwart of Holy Island birding, posted a short tweet ( I am as likely to change that to X as I am to change the name of a Ross's Gull) about his year of garden birds. This had me thinking, whilst a lot of time is spent birding from my garden, I never really summarise it or keep a real eye on what has occurred over the year.  With the garden being my Local Patch epicentre, thats one thought for next year.

Another strand I've pondered, is how to change from as many written notes to more sketches and illustrations that I enjoy doing. This always leads me to a dead end as its just not possible to cover a days birding, fully, in sketch form. without missing loads of stuff.

More to think about in coming weeks.

The last 10 days have been spent locally as usual.

Last Friday a nice bit of birding fortune came my way. Late morning, standing at the office printer, in a daze, I glanced out of the first floor windows, to see a lovely sunny early winters day. Just the type of day, you could imagine a flock of Waxwings catching the sun on top of some trees maybe. So, I sauntered the 20 or so feet from the printer to the window and gazed across the car par towards the main A189 dual carriageway. Surely not? There was a single bird sat right at the top of a roadside Ash, It is too far for details it looked like a medium sized dumpy blob. Then more appeared as if from nowhere, 9 in total all on top of highest twigs nicely spaced. Too neat for Starlings. Then the clincher. Two began flycatching like oversized Spotted Flycatchers climbing high to snatch an unseen insect and gliding back, bee-eater fashion to their perch. A flock of Waxwings! Well predicted by me!

To be fair, I have seen them in this exact spot some years ago so it is favoured, but there were a genuine surprise. I decided to check them with my scope that was in the boot of the car, but as I glanced back from my desk they had all gone and did not return. I'm not having much luck nailing these fluffy buggers down...

This brings me to Sunday. We tend to expect very quiet days in winter but if you are lucky a nice little list of birds can be found.

JWR and I met up at Boulmer main car park at 7.45am. From here we decided to wander north around Longhoughton Steel and back and maybe have a sit and wait at the north end, which we did.

Out to sea 3 duck Goldeneye flew S , 6 Red throated Divers loafed and fished, as did 25 or so Gannets, En route to the Steel we had 4 Purple Sandpipers on the rocks. 3 Shelduck flew S and 1 ad and 1 fw Little Gull flew N. 

A nice start.

We loitered around the Longhoughton Steel bench for a while. Here, a nice Woodcock arrived in-off, landed briefly then continued west. On the sea towards Howick were 5 Goldeneye inc 2 males, and a nice drake Long tailed Duck with last weeks female. Common Scoter females had increased by one to 8 birds. Over head a light movement of Pinkfeet with 80 and 62 birds south.

Ive not had a Wigeon on my patch list this year so 40 on the shore here can just about be scoped from the south end of the homestead. One to bear in mind. 

4 Black tailed Godwits N here was a nice record for our wetland impoverished bit of rocky coast.

The wander back to the car park was uneventful but another sit and watch tea from the car boot gave us some more to look at. 73+ Dunlin, 18+ Ringed Plover, 16+ Bar tailed Godwits, 50+ Lapwings, 4+ Grey Plover and 19 Sanderlings were all regulars but still nice nonetheless.

As we were about to head home, John picked out a little Merlin sitting on the rocks offshore. It sat a while before doing a drag start across the haven towards our waders. Here, it was unlucky when it missed a Dunlin when the bird dropped, in defence, into the shallow water to hide. The Merlin gave up on that and headed, low, back over the bay to the rocks. As it arrived, it flushed the Lapwings and a few more Dunlin high and away, but one Dunlin was a bit slower and remained seated. The Merlin by now was just about a metre over its head and on its way past when it caught sight of the dozing calidrid.

In one move, the Merlin stalled, back pedalled and stuck out a leg, grabbing the wader from its slumber and into the air. They came to rest a short distance away on the weed covered rocks where the falcon administered the last rites before eating every morsel in front of us. Gruesome. but still amazing! 

Above - Merlin and top, same bird eating a Dunlin. 

Alnwick...and around.

 Since last week's twitch, things have been back to normal around NE66.  

A few new birds have been moving through the patch as would be expected by now.  Siskins are daily seen passing over but only one male has been on my feeders. Two Bramblings on the return leg of their winter stay called in. A female with the Chaffinch flock on Wednesday then today I heard a familiar 'wheezing' note, like a Greenfinch but softer. As Greenies have a sad new status in these parts I paused and wonderd if it was a singing Brambling? Sure enough, there he was up a small tree singing away, still in winter plumage. Its a sorry state when a singing Brambling is almost as likely as a singing Greenfinch locally...

A bitterly cold NW wind on Saturday gave zero chance of summer land birds so I had an hour seawatch from Rumbling Kern. Its not as much of a point as Cullernose and is in the shadow of Boulmer but it can be ok for gulls and terns.

1600- 1710 - 

Red breasted Merganser 1 drake N

Sandwich Tern 5 N ( first terns of the season)

Razorbill 14 identified many auks too far out

Common Gull 98 N

Kittiwake 130 N

Gannet 50 N ( I don’t usually count Gannets and Kittis but early on there isn’t much else)

Fulmar 2 N

Shelduck 1 N

Common Scoter 4 N

Goosander 1 redhead S

Whooper Swan 2 N

Lesser black backed Gull 1 N

Shag 1 N ( rarely count these either, but there was only one today so for completeness)

Red throated Diver 1 N

Purple Sandpiper 15+ on the rock with 15+ Turnstones.

Sunday remained cold but very bright and clear so we checked some of our inland sites around Alnwick.

A circular walk along the new local railway and back into the industrial estate by the wooded Cawledge Burn turned up common woodland species with 15+ Chiffchaffs, 5 Great spotted Woodpeckers, 4 Redwing, 2+ Sparrowhawks and best of all, on a small drainage settling pond on the estate, a Green Sandpiper. A nice little find on the edge of suburbia. 

Disclaimer. This post might be a bit pic heavy...

As you can imagine a Green Sandpiper on a tiny pond, it was never going to end well so after about 30 seconds off it went calling on the way.

After a short stop for supplies at Greggs, it was time to get a little bit more rural, well, 5 miles more...

In the bright sun some typical moorland wildlife was seen but none of the hoped for Ring Ouzels or Wheatears yet...

A massive flock of Northern Golden Plovers looked great in this light. 

On last years Ring Ouzel field there was scarcely room for one as it was packed with Northern Golden Plovers. At least 700, possibly up to 900 birds present running everywhere and flying short distances making an accurate count impossible. We couldnt find a Dotterel...

Nearby a small Adder, 5+ displaying Redpolls, 1 Stonechat and more Chiffchaffs went into the book.

After a good stretch of legs with not much more to add, we came across a nice pair of Red Grouse.

Him n her Red Grouse. Not much compensation for acres of burnt moorland.

 Shortly after the grouse we rounded a corner to briefly meet the day's second highlight. On the wires, an adult male Merlin sat with an entourage of mipits and linnets keeping an eye on him, even providing outriders to escort him away from their territories as he flew off.

So, few migrants and no rares but we still enjoyed a very pleasing morning out . 

Male Merlin and his Mipit Mates. 

  

Jack gets Gold!

This morning I met John at Homebase with a plan to go looking for Crossbills at Thrunton Woods.

With a few Parrot Crossbills further south, you never know. Its donkeys years since I last saw a Parrot Crossbill, but that wasn't about to change today. We managed about 15 Common Crossbill in pairs with singing males on territory and very little else other than wet feet as I'd forgotton my wellies.

Back home, and the sun shobe nicely this afternoon so I thought I'd try a photo of the Coal Tits coming to my feeders. As I loitered, our friendly local racing pigeon ( Pigeon John) was on high alert. All of a sudden he erupted into flight and off and warp speed. Then the village jackdaws were all up, calling so I stepped out and scanned upwards, only to see, a little jack Merlin going like a rocket towards our feeders. His speed flushed everything for a hundred yards into the air.

He locked on to a small passerine from the feeder flock as they took to the air and chased it over the back field. The Merlin was loop the looping over our house so fast I couldn't even find it in my view finder let alone take a picture. As it chased the hapless passerine out over our back field into the open it made a speedy attack only for the prey to side swerve out of the way. Merlin towered high above then dropped like an arrow, just missing again. This happened again and seemed to tire out the target. Then finally Merlin came in at a million miles per hour and grabbed our bird from behind. It was over.

No Christmas meal for this little fellow.

The Merlin glided fast and low towards the fence line and landed to eat his meal.

I scrabbled for the scope and good views were had of the Merlin and one of our Goldfinches on the post. One of our neighbours who is interested in wildlife happened to be passing, so I was pleased to get him a good scope view of the lovely slatey blue Merlin on the post. Soon a Magpie flushed jack another couple of hundred yards up the fence where he totally cleared off his meal then sat scanning around the scene. He was in view for over half an hour. 

What a bird!

The only shot I got, but you can just see the goldfinches face hanging below...