White- winged Intuition...

My drive to work takes me along some nice scenic Northumberland coastal spots. In particular I enjoy the short stretch between Warkworth and Amble where the road accompanies the River Coquet on its final leg to the sea. There are always birds to see, even from the moving car, a heron on the weir, or an egret fishing in the shallows maybe. Sometimes a few Black tailed Godwits are feeding right beside the road making an id possible from almost periphery views.

On Tuesday it was such a loose drive-by scan that made me notice quite a good gathering of Great black backed Gulls on the increasingly exposed sand bar as the tide receded. I wondered if I had time to pull in to the car park for a quick look? Now this is a very short bit of road for thinking so I was almost on top of the junction when I swung into the car park almost without braking.

Right, I have 10 mins to check the flock, so scope out, a 50mtr brisk walk to the watersports centre to view the estuary and start at the far left. GBB after GBB all nice and contrasty in the morning light, then after about 50 or so, bingo, a bright white apparition looms into view, floating down the old water channel at the back, a huge 3rd winter Glaucous Gull. It, has a long thick bill and a big head so is probably a male, and it slowly drifted onto the sand bar where it sat idly gazing around, having a drink and a bit of a preen. I watched it for a few minutes then continued my once only scan to the right just in case.

Nothing new jumped out so, after one more look at the Glauc, I packed up and left for work, smug in the knowledge that my intuition had been correct. With all the new Great black backs I would have been disappointed if there hadn't been a Glauc in there!

I had a more typical juv Glaucous Gull here just before New Year, but this almost white bird was very different. These days it is very uncommon to see anything other than juv Glaucous on our coast and I cant remember the last adult I've seen here?  Anyway, it is always pleasing to get a prile of white wingers before the end of January ( Med Gull, Iceland and Glaucous) . Lets hope one of the rarer ones might follow before spring...

[Note - I thought this bird was a 2nd winter but some hunting on the Internet shows that its pale iris makes it a 3rd winter.]

  

Snow...

This is a nondescript post really. I have been on holiday since last Thursday, but not been very far as I have been keeping our new arrival happy and getting her used to life in darkest Northumberland. Meet Peggy, a Patterdale x Lakeland cross, 4 yrs old ( or so they tell us) and a refugee for Darlington Dogs Trust. Peggy only arrived at the trust a week past Saturday and we collected her on the following Tuesday. She is a timid little thing and was in need of a loving home, so as we had a terrier sized hole to fill, we thought she would fit the bill...

Other than that, the other highlight of the week, was this -

... Snow! We haven't had lying snow here for at least 3 years, so this was a bit of a novelty. We do get snow a short way inland, but on the coast it is a real rarity these days.

This morning's walk uncovered a very small hard weather movement of 8 Fieldfares, 90 Golden Plover, 1 Mistle Thrush and 3 Meadow Pipits all S along our coast path. This afternoon a short look along the village lane had a nice flock of birds in a small, low-yield, corn crop stubble - 250+ Linnets, 32+ Stock Doves and a male Sparrowhawk.

But, its back to work tomorrow and Friday where the day is spent wishing for lighter nights...

Fowl play...

Out this morning down the coast with JWR. We checked Amble braid and harbour and Hadston T junction with little to show.

A flock of 200+ Pink footed Geese next to the road at Hauxley held a single neck collared bird - Silver or Grey UBB. Don't those collars look bloody awful, but they are very effective, being easy to see and then to read with the scope.

A stop at Widdrington Moor Lake was quite productive with a large female Peregrine sitting on the same rock as a bird we watched last year at this time. She looked around casually, probably deciding whether to try duck or lapwing. Also here were 2 Great Northern Divers at the eastern end of the lake, a drake Pochard, seemingly rarer than the divers lately, 3 Goldeneye and a few commoner ducks.

Breakfast was calling so a detour via the Drift Cafe for a full Veggie offering was a fine set up for the rest of the morning.

We moved back up to Druridge Budge Fields to look for Water Pipit. On route a female Merlin dashed through Bell's Links, S.

In the freezing cold steel observation screen at the Budge Fields there were good numbers of wildfowl to scan through - 100+ Teal, 400+ Wigeon, Mallard, 10+ Shoveler and a nice drake Pintail.
While counting Teal, on the hunt for a Green-winged, all of the Wigeon flew off the bank into some water between dense juncus. I put the scope on them and was straight onto an 'American' Wigeon. It was swimming hard left toward vegetation, so I got John onto it, then it vanished into the cover.

A further half an hour plus passed by without a sign then all birds flew out again. This time John picked it up at half the distance. This time we could get a better view in a well lit position. As it fed, it was soon obvious that all was not quite right here. The bird's supposedly green eye band was actually a nice bronze colour mainly at the back. The body was a nice brick pink but had a lot more grey wash on it than it should too. I wondered if it could be a trick of the light as it looked good in the first view.

I discussed it with others in the screen, in particular Jonathan and Tariq Farooqi who were now also of the opinion our bird was showing a few too many Eurasian Wigeon features to be a pure American Wigeon. We took a phone scoped shot or two that confirmed our fears. Our new yank was indeed only half way there. An American Wigeon hybrid. Oh well you cant win them all, it was an education and it did get the adrenaline flowing when first seen....

Check here, in particular the Cley bird in 2015.....

Also here were 1 or even 2 Water Pipits and 1 Little Egret.

A phone scoped effort and below, my notebook. Sketched on site coloured back home.

A sunny day.

And what better than to head down to the coast before first light to see what is around as the sun rises.
I met John at Boulmer first thing. As we scanned from the car park there were plenty of birds to see - a Pale Bellied Brent Goose swam with a couple of Shelducks and there were loads of gulls milling about. We hoped that last week's Ros's might drop by, but it didnt, nor did the highly unseasonal Whimbrel seen the other day by Ben on the pool behind the pub ( Bull's Mere).

As the sun rose, good numbers of divers began moving around and soon we had logged 43 Red throated Divers N and 3 Great Northerns in with them. As they headed north, a steady movement of Pink footed Geese went south totalling 180. Also moving at sea were 4 Goldeneye, 6 Common and 1 Velvet Scoter with good numbers of auks.

In the flooded field were 70+ Lapwing and more gulls.

We wandered along to Longhoughton Steel where the newly exposed shore held lots of waders including 18+ Bar tailed Godwit, 251 Curlew, 600+ Golden and 5 Grey Plover, 13 Purple Sandpipers, 20+ Turnstone, 17 Knot, 100+ Dunlin and 66 Sanderling.

A male Peregrine almost caught a Lapwing over the sea but lacked the stamina.

A few ducks were around including 30 Wigeon, 40 Mallard and 10 Shelduck but 3 Gadwall in-off were more surprising.

The only passerines noted were 2 Stonechat, 10 Pied Wagtail, 2 Rock Pipit and about 6 Song Thrushes.

After tea and a scone we had a look up to High Newton where we walked across the fields to Football Hole and back by the Tin Church.

A local told us he had seen two Short eared Owls here this morning but we couldnt find them. Apart from the lovely sunshine and sea views the best we had were 24 Goldeneye, 100+ Golden Plover, 4+ Yellowhammer, Grey Partridge, Treecreeper and Goldcrest.

The moon rose over the arctic...

Picture it. It is 31st December 2017, New Year's Eve, 3.30pm.

Up here, it gets dark early at this time of year, around 4.15pm.

All birders across the land are posting a hootenanny of the years birding highlights across all social media platforms. There are pictures of Rock Thrushes, Yellow Warbler, Orphean Warbler and Needletail. Everyone tucked up at home awaiting the nights revelry, reviewing the best birds 2017 had to offer.

All I had to do was discuss the splitting of Isabelline Shrike into god knows what on our county WhatsApp group, when I saw a cryptic message appear from Tom Cadwallender saying 'I'll be there soon Ben' or something similar. I shrugged and thought Tom had posted on the wrong channel, then carried on. 

I automatically flicked to our 'Rare Birds' channel and was floored. While we were sitting in front of a warm fire, Ben Steele was out in a gale watching gulls roosting on the rocks at Longhoughton Steel near Boulmer. A good job he was too, because in with hundreds of Black headed, Common and Herring Gulls was a little snowflake from the far North, a Ross's Gull, the first to visit our shores since 2014! [ well, after Ross Ahmed's untwitchable sighting at Lindisfarne the other week, indeed this might be the same bird]

I raced along in the car, a 10 minute journey from home, then ran the half a mile north to the spot. When I say 'ran' it was more like jogged, strode, choked, gagged, coughed and walked.

On arrival Ben, Tom and Mu had taken their eyes off the ball and our arctic rose was concealed in a mass of white sleeping birds.  The large full moon rose over the sea and I was getting a bit fidgety. A few others arrived then Farooqi jnr called 'There it is, flying'. No need to panic as it only flew 10 yards then dropped into the pack. At least we now had its location.

In the ever dimming light of 2017, the 7 lucky birders who either live close enough or were birding near enough to Boulmer managed views that varied from ok and reasonable to down right shocking, but when its a new bird for my Northumberland  list, I cared little... this enigma of the ice is one of my very favourite birds, even giving the outstanding Wryneck a run for its money. So my third ever Ross's Gull and a welcome county grip-back.
Unfortunately it was gone by dawn on New Years Day and not seen again... but...

remember people, it is still out there somewhere...

Sunset on New Years Day and some disappointed twitchers, 24 hours too late.

Ross's Gull, adult winter, Longhoughton Steel, Boulmer.

Bunty.

You might think I have just abandoned the blog over recent weeks, but I just wasn't that interested.

Christmas has been a dreadful time for us.

Back in September our lovely Bunty had a small lesion on her eyebrow. After several visits to the vet and more lesions cropping up on her, some biopsies taken in November found that she had lymphoma, a type of cancer, and there was nothing we could do.

After battling with her illness for several weeks, our little raggy dog finally succumbed on 23rd December. We are now finding recovery very difficult indeed. She was our life. Even writing this is proving to be a task.

Anyway, I will leave you with a few pictures of how we remember her, as a firey little bundle of laughs. The next doggy to live here has some big shoes to fill...

Another type of Christmas Red breast....

On Sunday, a,near adult or adult Red breasted Goose turned up with the Pinkfeet in Druridge Bay, near Hemscott Hill Farm.

I assumed it to be the bird that has frequented Big Waters, near Newcastle, since the autumn, but, now that it 'looked wild' I thought I would have a look, for insurance purposes you understand.

The bird at Big Waters was originally with some Greylags, and looked nothing like being wild, so I didnt bother with it. As Sunday progressed, word came out that this might be a different individual. Also fanning the flame, apparently there was a dark bellied Brent and a Barnacle Goose with it, so it could end up being accepted by BBRC. Mmmm...

Monday morning before work was lovely and sunny with a light ground frost as I pulled into the Drift Cafe car park, at Cresswell. The Red breasted Goose was feeding only a hundred yards away behind the cafe, with some vigilant Pinkfeet and, sure enough, a Dark bellied Brent and a Barnacle Goose were near by.

I set up my scope to grill the bird. What a real stunner it was, a harlequin, bedecked in black, white and chestnut, shorter than the Pinkfeet with a smaller bill too. Possibly one of the smartest of the whole wildfowl crew.

Then the bomb dropped. As it wandered around, I noticed it was wearing the trappings of captivity in the form of a blue/grey closed ring on its left leg. It was just a fine band, and on a black leg it would be impossible to see at range, but here, at scope filling range, there was no doubt, our bird was a fence -hopper!

Oh well, never mind, one day we might get a real one...

Freezing Nutcrackers.

This morning was a proper cold day, the likes of which we have not seen for at least 3 years and possibly a lot longer. It was -6 degrees until 9am, and this morning was no warmer than -1 by lunchtime. At least it was sunny and calm, a grand winters day to be out.

Our first stop was East Chevington where 80% of the north pool was frozen solid. In the open areas, only kept ice free by the wildfowl swimming around were 34 Whooper Swans, 49 Goldeneye, 2 Long tailed Ducks, the Great Northern Diver, 11 Little Grebes and a lot of other assorted commoner wildfowl. Two Water Rails squealed from the reeds closest to us.

Down to the burn mouth where 35 Twite, 8+ Pied Wagtail , 10 Sanderling fed on the beach and a Stonechat was nearby. 4 Bullfinches fed in a lovely frosty, berry laden sea buckthorn.

Sea Buckthorn

Time to get warmed up, so it was off to the Drift Cafe at Cresswell for breakfast.

On the way, a field at Druridge was full of Golden Plover near the road, They looked really smart in the frosted grass but the camera was in the car boot...

As we drove past Cresswell pond, it was frozen solid with all of the wildfowl looking lost standing on the ice. Teal appeared the most abundant with maybe 200+ birds present.

After a grand, full veggie breakfast we headed off to Morpeth for a look at the Hawfinches at Abbey Mill.

We saw one bird as soon as we arrived sitting atop a lone bare tree looking like a giant amongst a flock of about 30 Siskins.

Above - Hawfinches.

For the next hour we were treated to lots of brief views of both male and female birds flying and perched. We must have seen at least half a dozen though only 3 together at once. The metallic 'Chiznk' calls were heard as they took flight over the trees. One female showed very well munching on the hornbeam keys for about 15 minutes.

It is a pleasure to meet up with these birds again after such a long absence. Those of us long enough in the tooth can remember that Hawfinch was an annual delectation at places like Hulne Park, Hexham and Wallington Hall back in the 80s/ early 90s with flocks up to 35 strong at Hulne where I've seen them courtship feeding in yews down to only a few feet. I have been lucky enough to see them at those sites just mentioned but also at Bothal, Sandhoe, Stobswood and Howick over the years. It would be great if that could happen again, they're fantastic birds.

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...

End of season analysis.

End of the moth season that is.

This is the end of the 8th full year trapping in our garden, after some test sessions in autumn 2009.

Located in Northumberland we are in a large county divided roughly in half into two vice counties - VC67 and 68. Our garden is in the most northerly VC in  England, VC68 North Northumberland, only about 30 miles from the Scottish border.

I haven't totalled up the individual moths caught, even though all were submitted to the County Recorder for inclusion in the database but it seems to have been a decent year by species numbers.

The list is as follows -

2017 - 361 including 21 new species.
2016 - 302 including 8 new species ( a litttle less effort last year avoiding Large Yellow Underwings)
2015 - 331 including 12 new species
2014 - 367 including 27 new species
2013 - 363 including 34 new species
2012 - 344 including 46 new species
2011 - 340 including 56 new species
2010 - 332 and 258 new species.

So far the garden total is 549 species (the MapMate list).

It never ceases to amaze me how new species can still occur after this time...

Below are images of this years new additions.

15.084 Phyllonorycter acerifoliella 3rd Northumberland, 1st VC68 

16.008 Yponomeuta sedella 4th Northumberland, 2nd VC68 

16.010 Zelleria hepariella 30th Northumberland, 6th VC68 

16.014 Pseudoswammerdamia combinella 8th Northumberland, 5th VC68

19.011 Acrolepiopsis assectella Leek Moth 1st Northumberland and VC68 record!

35.141 Teleiodes vulgella 27th Northumberland 3rd VC68

37.044 Coleophora discordella 49th Northumberland, 23rd VC68 

45.043 Adaina microdactyla Hemp Agrimony Plume 2 of them, 6th -7th Northumberland and VC68 records.

49.022 Ptycholoma lecheana 11th Northumberland, 2nd VC68

49.087 Acleris literana 36th Northumberland, 5th VC68

49.111 Eupoecilia angustana

49.307 Rhyacionia pinivorana Spotted Shoot Moth 40th Northumberland 4th VC68

70.038 Rhodometra sacraria Vestal 41st Northumberland, 6th VC68

70.150 Eupithecia linariata Toadflax Pug 6th VC68

70.198 Lobophora halterata Seraphim 1st VC68 record

73.036 Acronicta alni Alder Moth  6th VC68 record

73.076 Helicoverpa armigera Scarce Bordered Straw  4th VC68 record.

73.100 Chilodes maritima Silky Wainscot Surprisingly the 22nd Northumberland, 12th VC68 record, nowhere near a reedbed.

73.235 Polymixis lichenea Feathered Ranunculus 1st Northumberland and VC68 record!

73.272 Papestra biren Glaucous Shears

Migrant Moths

 

Vestal was new for the garden moth trap on 23rd October, a rare migrant.

Especially for Roger...

The other day my friend Roger asked where was the post I had written about my childhood. After some scrolling around here it is.... Click Here

The Little B.......

Despite the seemingly adverse weather conditions for migrants, I have done alright this week and seen a few interesting birds.

On Wednesday, I was amazed to see that a Bee-eater had turned up at Druridge. Likely one of our pair seen on Sunday, so at lunchtime I popped along to get a better view. Unfortunately it had gone north and did not return before I had to get back. Old school Northumberland birders have waited for ever to see Bee-eater in the county, so after 35 years, I thought I finally had a 'blocker' on my list. That lasted three days.... Still, it is good when everyone can catch up with such a precious find.

While scanning for the Bee-eater, a Water Pipit just in front of the Budge Screen made the trip a worthwhile one.

On Thursday there was a short deviation in the long term westerlies we have been suffering with a short SE breeze. Immediately large numbers of thrushes were arriving. At home, Redwings, Blackbirds, Brambling and a nice sat-out Woodcock started proceedings before work. At lunchtime I had a walk along the disused railway lines at Cambois. The highlight here was a male Ring Ouzel, a belated year tick, with 150+ Redwings, 20+ Blckbirds, 50+ Song Thrushes and 6 Bullfinch.

I called in to Druridge again on Friday before work. The Bee-eater was still in residence, this time watched briefly say on a barbed wire fence preening before making off towards Chevington again. A distant Swallow will probably be my last, a Little Egret flew south. I returned at lunchtime but missed the Bee-eater again ( its giving me the run around this bird) where the best on offer was a nice Little Owl perched on a chimney at the farm.

No frame filling insect snapping shots for me, but I'll take it.

     Later on Friday, Gary Woodburn found a Little Bunting on his patch at Low Newton. He sent some tempting photos of this tiny emberiza so Saturday morning found me loitering along the path to Newton Point hoping to catch up with only my second Little Bunt after one on Holy Island in the mid 90s. I have dipped a few since.

At first things didnt look promising with a seemingly birdless tree and too much cover to hide a small brown streaky bird but Gary soon refound it and called us over. What performer too. This lethargic bunting slowly clambered around its chosen sycamore gleaning aphids from the leaves. It often sat motionless for several minutes making it tricky to find but in all, half an hours viewing in good sunshine was enough and the bird just evaporated into cover.

Two close Yellow-browed Warblers together padded things out abit, plus Brambling, Chiffchaff, Blackcap and Mealy Redpoll added to the variety.

Saturday Little Bunting views.

 Sunday dawned in a different fashion with Storm Brian having just passed over through the night leaving us with a gusty NW wind that was quite chilling. Not great prospects for John seeing the Little Bunting. I thought it might still be there, but did not expect to find it in this wind.

Luckily John had other ideas and the first bird he looked at was the bunting. In the early morning light it skulked amongst the same sycamore branched for a few minutes then we lost it. A further two and a half hours passed before it appeared in the open from nowhere. This time it showed even better than yesterday picking tiny aphids off the leaves, and for one great moment it shared a binocular view witha lovely Yellow-browed Warbler! I am tempted to say 'stunning'.

While scanning for the bunting I had a heart stopper when for all of a millisecond, bright grass green apparition with white wing bars appeared in my bins that could only have been a firecrest but its head was obscured by leaves and I did not see it again.  Frustrating.

We ended the morning with a glance at the sea off Football hole where the only birds of note were 3 Red throated Divers and John had a Woodcock in-off.

Not too shabby a week on the westerlies....

Above - Little Bunting. What a great bird.