yorkslister

2012-01-31T20:36:00.001Z

I spend more time than most looking at seagulls and therefore see my fair share of white wingers, which is why it's pissing me off that in the biggest Iceland Gull influx in my birding lifetime I can't find any whilst my mate Frenchy is swanning around in Scotland tripping over them and seeing a few Kumlien's in the process.
I've been doing the tips and roosts when I can but drawn a blank, until today when driving down the A64 nr Scarborough tip I saw an obvious juv winger from the car but thought it looked a bit big. I pulled over and sure enough juv Glauc, fuckin ell what do I have to do to score an Iceland?

I've managed to blag myself access onto the tip at Scarborough which should ensure decent views as the birds are often very distant from the public rights of way so I was pretty fired about that until today when they informed me it's the last day of tipping it's now gonna be covered over and landscaped, BASTARD!!!!!

This is what I'd been looking forward to, it's pretty monster but can be a bit hard to see the wood for the trees as it were!

I meant to post this link ages ago but forgot all about it so have a look at this seems pretty topical as this post is all about dumps

http://www.shorebirder.com/2010/11/gulling-at-landfill.html

I nearly pissed myself laughing at this and reckon all gullers have had that conversation a few times.

Anyway here's a Kumlien's I did find a few years ago, seems I'm gonna have to be satisfied with that one cos it's not looking good for this year they'll all be off back home in a few weeks

2012-01-19T20:28:00.000Z

Had a couple of hours out this afternoon, was going to go see if the cracking 1st w Caspo was at Wheldrake but by the time I tore myself away from the Snooker it was too late to be worh it. So I decided on a trip to North Cave where there was a second w Med Gull on the main lake but not many other Gulls so I ventured to Newport tip where there was one Common Gull in the field where they all sit but knack all else.

Shite phonescoped pic cos my camera was still plugged int the computer after downloading the Cattle Egret pics yesterday. The light was so bright the phone couldn't deal with the contrasty conditions!

With only about an hour or so before dark Fafleet seemed like the best bet. Turned out to be a pretty good hour in the end with 22 Marsh and a single Hen Harrier hunting over the reedbeds or moving upriver towards Blacktoft to roost. Many of the Gulls that use the tips in the area such as Holme on Salding Moor, Newport and even Harewood whin at York use the Humber to roost so literally thousands of Gulls were coming in from the north. unfortunately they were all distant to the east so I couldnt nail the one white winger. It looked like an Iceland gull prob a second winter or worn faded juv but s it just looked white I cant rule out an albino/leucistic Herring. I'll probably go down and try to find vantage point to view this roost in the next week or so as it's cetinly the largest roost in E.Yorks.

2012-01-18T23:09:00.002Z

I didn't mention that I saw the Cattle egret at Top Hill on Sunday morning. I didn't spend long looking at it cos it was through a hedge as it walked round the front garden of Easingwold farm. So this afternoon I called into Hempholme to have another look at it. It showed really well along the grass at the side of the boatyard.

All the above pics taken at about 30 metres range in shit light and hand held at 800 ISO. I really need to get an adapter and cable release for this camera, I reckon the results in good light with a proper set up will be really impressive.

It seems this bird has raised the old argument about supression. Whilst I haven't had the story first hand I've had it from good sources including the county recorder and one of the lads from Top hill and it seems some of the regulars there were told about the bird by the local farmer and have been seeing it since before the new year but kept it quiet as the farmer asked them not to release news. Trouble is they said the road and land are private which isn't true and in any case you can park at Top hill and walk half an hour to view it there are also plenty of public footpaths. It's a shame really as althoough it's not a mega rare bird it's still a good county record and it leaves a bad taste in the mouth. I have to say I've lost a bit of respect for one person in particular who I have considered a friend for a long time, and might not be quite as quick to let him know about the next decent bird at Spurn.

Jack Frost

2012-01-17T20:49:00.000Z

Still haven't sorted out the pics of the Bean Geese and Shrikes, I've been too busy fixing central heating and birding so you've had a reprieve! Being in E.Yorks I'm pretty blessed with decent birding sites, there's North Cave, Swinemoor and any number of sites on the Humber or coast including my favourite Hornsea. But one site I never give much time to is Top Hill Low, it's got a great track record for pulling in good birds including a particular Falcon we won't mention! But what's struck me lately is just how good it is in winter for general birding. I had a walk round there on Sunday morning and saw Smew, Pintail, Merlin, Peregrine, and a decent flock of Whitefronts. In the last few weeks I've done the roost 5 tims and only one had anyone else there so it's certainly not given too much coverage. Then again long shanks Martin tells me there's only been 2 white winged Gulls in about the last ten years that have roosted on more than one night so maybe it's not worth putting too much time in! I have at least seen a regular adult Med Gull on most visits and a 1st winter once.

Themed is an 95 videograb from some footage hand held tonight at about 4.25pm!!!!

It's been pretty nippy round here the last few days and the frost has been spectacular, here's a few arty shots of the frost.

These are all with the S95 just sharpened and cropped but no other manipulation done.

Happy feckin new year

2012-01-05T20:48:00.000Z

It appears Yorkslister has been too busy to update the blog! I'm not too sure what I've been doing though as I certainly haven't been doing much birding, in fact I've done exactly none since early December, apart from when working that is.

In the couple of weeks following the last post I did manage to see the desert Wheatear at Bempton a couple of times, although strong winds made it very hard to get any good pics of it. Here's the best I managed.

And on the same day I saw a smart adult Caspin Gull pickd out by an eagle eyed Yorks newcomer Lee Johnson at North cave which performed well and allowed pics and video which nailed all the features. Unusual in yorks as not many records make the grade despite being claimed with increasing regularity. heres a couple of shots of it.

Right I'm off but will be updating again over the coming days with Grey Shrikes and Bean Geese, you have been warned!!!!

It's an age thing!

2011-11-20T13:10:00.000Z

And I don't mean getting laughed at by 20 year old lasses when you try unsuccessfully to chat them up, this is far worse. Well it has far worse consequences anyway.

What am I on about? Not concentrating enough. Specifically not concentrating enough when reading the pager/twitter feed. After an initial urge to go to K*nt had subsided it seems I'd kind of glazed over when checking Birdnet's excellent Twitter feed (shameless plug) and read Northumberland as K*nt, or more likely not even read it at all and just flicked past it.

So after I'd been blissfully unaware of the presence of an eastern Black Red on Holy Island for 2 days I set off rather belatedly. It would have been rude not to cos as it happens (nice bit of Jimmy there) I was staying in Newcastle Friday night for work so someone else effectively paid for most of my fuel costs.

So about the bird then, well what a fuckin stunner, as most people do I love Chats they surely have the best shapes around. As I got there quite late everyone else had fecked off and left the bird in peace which meant I got pornstar views of it as it fed on insects around my feet that I'd disturbed walking along through the rocks.

There was no chance of any pics of it as the light was too poor but I'm constantly amazed at how good video comes out in low light conditions. Here's a couple of short sequences.

It's fuckin Baltic!!!!

2011-11-17T20:03:00.000Z

Well at least I was after spending 2 and a bit hours looking at the Gull at Bempton this aft, dunno what it is yet though. And to be honest probably never will as it hasn't got a ring on it's leg. My pics aren't the best so I'll probably go back tomorrow and try for better ones once I've thawed out a bit.

Whatever this bird is it's certainly distinctive enough being in full juv though worn plumage and very small, it's not much bigger than a Common Gull and has very long wings which actually mask how small it is when it's flying round.

Here's a couple of shots of them from Cyprus (albeit in March so 4 months later) to compare

I've probably already seen a Baltic Gull in Yorkshire. I was in Beacon Ponds hide in July 2004 with John Grist when we found a third cal yr bird which seemed to tick all the right boxes but unfortunately it flew off south before we'd worked out the exact state of moult. Then again that bird didn't have a ring either so we would still be none the wiser.

2011-11-15T19:41:00.000Z

Here's another shot of the Arctic Poll from last week, this one showing the undertail better, it's a digibinned shot so not much better quality wise than the vid grabs. But shows another feature to shut up the anonymous poster/wind up merchant.

Went back down to Spurn on Wednesday but despite conditions looking really good I didn't see too much. The Pied Wheatear and the Poll were both seen briefly early morning then not seen again all day despite much searching, strange thing is one birder jammed in on both but others weren't so lucky..........he claims to have corroborating observers!

Had a bit of work to away from home on Thurs/Fri so didn't get out. Then most of Sat was taken up with a committee meeting at Spurn. I managed to miss the Richards Pipit and, well everything else apart from a flock of White Fronts and Barnacles in with the Brents.

Sun involved a stupidly early morning start for a trip up to Hauxley for the Greater Legs. Got that one wapped off pretty quickly plus the Grey Phal. It just shows how daft this chasing rare birds thing is really, ask most birders which they'd rather see and they'd say Greater Legs but look at them together in this pic and honestly the Phal kicks the Legs arse it's so much more stunning. Then again if they both move south into Yorks I know which one I'll be going for!!!

Phal outshining septic

Thanks to Rob Capewell for the pic. Believe it or not it's a phonescoped pic, and it was shite light so pretty impressive.

After the Phal Legs combo we went to the best the north east has to offer, first port of call was Marden Quarry in Whitley bay for the Lesser Scaup which duly flew in after we'd been thewre about 15 mins and wouldn't come to the 2 slices of bread I threw in. I was too tight to try enticing it with any more. They must not feed the young uns much up there cos The KingPrawn was eyeing up my Warburtons so we fucked off sharpish.

A few White Fronts and a brief catch up with a mate of mine and we decided to hit Marsden Quarry where we found a Swift......Bollocks!

I was only saying to one of the Spurn lads the other day if I ever find a late autumn Swifty thing I'm walking away cos they are nails to ID. I should have listened to myself cos we didn't walk away. Instead we wasted all afternoon trying to sort it out. The trouble was it looked brown and although I's normally say the blunt winged feature is a load of bollocks we all thought it was, it didn't have a big pale throat though, hmmm. Anyway with the foggy conditions we failed miserably to clinch it either way. Here's a couple of vid grabs of Jacks.

You can see it looks brown even against

the sky in this pic!

Does this look blunt to you?

So anyway after failing to sort out the Swift and having a large Pipit fly past which had probably come in off we decided on a mad dash to another of the great scenic spots of the north east we headed south for the Semi P. Unfortunately we'd left it too late and missed it, all we could manage were a couple of Shorties and a load of Seals.

2011-11-08T20:51:00.000Z

Firstly I have to start this post by telling you how sorry I am (seem to be doing a lot of apologising lately!) That I misled you by suggesting that I was ahead of Tim Isherwood. I'm not. In fact until the Wheatear Tim was one ahead of me, so we're now level, my mistake. You can stop sulking now Tim.

I went back for seconds of the Izzy on Sat and had a bit of a seawatch to try out my new toy, a Kowa 883. I'm very impressed with the 30x wide. But more on that later when it's cold and there's no birds to write about.

Sunday I had to make a mad dash over to Wintersett for the Penduline Tit. Feckin thing had fecked off tho. It's the first one since 92 in the county, with the exception of one that flew south at Spurn over 2 birders heeds a couple of years ago which was never submitted.

Anyway I had to dash back down Spurn today for the Pied Wheatear, the 3rd I've seen there now, seems like it's a good week for Wheatears maybe we'll finally get another Desert. You simply won't believe me if I tell you the last at Spurn was in 1962, I said you wouldn't believe it!

With this in mind I walked the cliff top along the caravan park and back down Beacon lane without seeing any rare Wheatears which is why I'm going to talk about finches! I was going to check the Crown car park for Hume's Warblers as there were a couple reported on the pager but I didn't get that far. I flushed this Arctic Redpoll from some nettles along the lane and didn't get any further before dark. Still nice though.

Looks like Carl White has taken it outside

Brief snatch of it's masseeve pale rump

Fancy a line?

With a Lesser

As you can see the light was shit but I managed to get these grabs off some of the video I took.

The colour of long worn underwear!

2011-11-04T18:36:00.000Z

Finally! Finally there's a good bird in Yorks. Finally I've got a Yorkshire tick, my first since spring 2010 and FINALLY I've gripped back Izzy Wheatear and pulled one clear of Tim Isherwood.

After my mate Gristi found an Izzy Wheatear near Sammies point in 1990 that I couldn't get a lift for It's been a massive ommision on my Yorks list. There was the Filey bird in 2006 that wasn't gettable and a couple of near misses from the Whitby area but I really was starting to think I'd not get this one back.

Fortunately Yorkshire's version of Geri Bagswell allegedly found a Wheatear nr the Narrows earlier, that's right a Wheatear, just a Wheatear. Apparently the date didn't make him even the least bit suspicious about it, and he didn't give it a second glance. The people that he mentioned it to did though and this is what they saw. Well actually they didn't cos it wasn't in Pauls hand when they saw it!

I saw the bird in the field for the requisite 2 seconds and ruled out Chaffinch and Wren then punched the air and yelled get fuckin in!!! I then watched it for 10-15 minutes until it wandered into one of Paul's spring traps. After being rung it was released in the same place and it continued actively feeding.

It's a very clear night up here tonight but the bird had no fat on it so hopefully it will stay for the Saturday crowds, they don't often though so It'll be a case of squeeky bum time for those travelling up tomorrow.

2011-10-28T17:12:00.000+01:00

I have been asked to point out that one of the Rubythroat pics I posted the other day may have been taken by Mr Micky Maher, top naturalist, all round nice guy and proud owner of a ticket to see the Stone Roses. But then again it may not have been taken by him cos he hasn't yet produced any evidence!

Lens and converter for sale

2011-10-24T13:07:00.000+01:00

Hello folks, I've decided to get rid of my camera lens. Since the demise of the camera body I haven't missed using it and have realised how much it was taking over my birding.

So if you or anyone you know is in the market for a new lens let me know. It's a Canon 300 f4.0 L IS USM and has a 1.4x extender with it. It still retains autofocus when using the extender. They are both boxed and have cases. They are both approx 29 months old and in very good condition. I'm looking for around £850 for them.

Sorry about the goose shit!

2011-10-21T19:37:00.000+01:00

Right in an effort to say sorry to several regular readers who were very offended by the goose stuff here's something a bit more topical.

A blatant way to show off some stunning birds from China! Not all the pics are mine, Thanks to Gav, Gristi, Adam and The F.

Just like Foula!

Amazingly none of us got a good shot of a fem

so had to make do with these!

It does have a rufous tail, honest

Typically skulking

Dross female

more dross!

Oh hang on!!!!

Ruby

And some more

2011-10-19T00:11:00.000+01:00

If you're totally fed up with reading about mega sibe chats and how spawny some people are to find them/receive early news about them/eat them (if cats count) then you've come to the right place I promise you you'll be back to the Punkbirder website before you've got to the end of the second paragraph of this shite!!!

Many people are getting themselves in a bit of a twist over the Red breasted Goose at Scaling dam, look (Lawts) it's fuckin dodgy innit. The only reason the birders up there are giving it a second look is they've had fuck all else all autumn. do yourselves a favour and don't waste the petrol money.

What you should probably do though is go to Hornsea and look at a goose with (probably) much better credentials for being wild. First indulge me while I give you a bit of background.

For a long time now 15+ years in fact there has been a flock of Barnacles at Hornsea in the winter usually numbering between 100 and 200 birds. They were always thought to be feral birds that come from Flamingoland, in recent years some have suggested they come from Whitton Sands. Wherever they come from they turn up at the right time of year and aren't too tardy about fucking off either. They always remain separate from the feral Greylags and Canada's on site and are wary and flush very easily, I know this because I've been trying to photograph them.

Anyone still here or has Punkbirder crashed under the weight of hits? Just in case Lawts is still reading I'll continue. In recent years a few people have been questioning the supposition that they were feral and a couple of winters ago Roy Lyon saw a bird with a colour ring. His pics and views were insufficient to read the number on it but it intrigued Mark Robinson enough that he spent time trying to record it, bingo when the number was sent off to the BTO it came back with the news it had been ringed as a nestling in Spitzbergen.

So that means at least some of the birds at Hornsea in the winter are tickable. The normal migration route for these spitzbergen birds is to come down the east coast to Northumberland and hang a right to the Solway but every year some overshoot and records come from many sites on the Yorks coast. It appears some of them are staying to winter.

Right that's the history of Barnacles covered. Now we know some of the Hornsea birds are genuine it's not too far fetched to realise they could carry other stuff with them, like vagrant Canada Geese. And it appears they may have done just that, in fact they might have been doing that for the last 2 winters as well but it's just not been deemed worthy news by those that have seen it, understandably really it's a goose afterall.

Now I have to confess that until a week ago I knew fuck all about vagrant Canada Geese except that I once found a minima type at the Swan feeding point at Fairburn and it was the same size as a Mallard!!! One week down the line I still know very little, in fact if you read Chris Batty's article in Birding world from 2001 and Martin Garners book of revelations then you'll know as much as I do. Actually that's not quite true you'll know as much about Canada Geese though.

The Bird at Hornsea would going on Chris' 2001 article be a parvipes but for the dark line running under the chin and which should make it a taverni but the bill seems too long. But nealry ten years on is this arrangement still valid? Martin would suggest otherwise if I'm reading his article correctly. It seems now that there are many more races than was considered ten years ago and many of the British records which seem not quite right for one race or another more easily fit into some of these new races. The trouble is it's all a work in progress and I certainly don't have any answers yet.

All I know is the Hornsea bird appears to be a small Canada,Martin would label it an intermediate bird in his simplified 3 types. I have only seen it with the Barnacles but called it a small race bird on structure in flight when it's short neck is very apparent. On the deck it's a bit more subtle with a long body making it look substantially bigger than the accompanying Barnacles but it's neck still looks short. Funnily enough the pics perhaps make it seem larger than in the field when it's often overlooked on a first scan of the flock whilst feeding Last winter during the cold snap a few feral Canada's where in the same field as the Barnacles and a couple of the other lads made a size comparison when they described it as fuckin tiny, elaborating further when pushed they said the normal Canada's dwarfed it. In the pics it does look a little on the large side so the spectre of it being a hybrid between a normal feral Canada and one of the small races can't be ruled out but I'll bet with more research it fits one of the new races quite nicely.

I'll be trying to get better pics in the next few days when the wind drops, these are all with my mobile. When I get some I'll be sending them to people who know more than me for comment. In the meantime it's make your mind up time if you want to travel for it.

2011-10-09T20:00:00.000+01:00

Twenty years ago I missed the Mugimaki Fly at Stone Creek, I've looked at the wood many times since and felt gutted, my only saviour was the fact the BOU dumped it into cat D. Seems my luck just ran out, with one caught in Italy the other day surely now the BOU have to look again at the record and upgrade it the same as they had to do when the Brown Fly turned up at Flamborough. Despite being one of the few of the top ten in Yorkshire who missed it I really think it should be on the list.

C'mon BOU surely now's the time to do the decent thing!

Septic!

2011-10-05T19:00:00.005+01:00

I'm getting a bit fed up with this. In the last month I've refound the SemiP on the Humber at Pat Haven, got shit pics and got nobody else onto it. Found the Pechora on Foula with Frenchy and only saw it in flight and got no pics (it was seen on the deck by another birder tho). Found the Arctic Warbler which fucked off after 15 minutes, and only 3 of us saw it (Bill did get some good pics tho) And now this!!

What's this? It's a fecking septic Goldie on the Wolds nr Driffield. I saw the bird ok, the wind was a bit of a pain but it showed well enough but it too fucked off before anyone else could get to see it, I also got more shit pics!! really shit with my phone cos I'd left the camera in the car by accident.

I've been back today but although I saw 350 Goldies the views were shit and it was even windier, so it could still be there, we'll have to see......it's not in this first pic, it's just to show the views I was getting today with the birds all hunkering down out of the wind.

Views like these aren't helpful!

Told you they were shit! You can see the size and colour tho.

Size difficult on this but looks dainty and long winged,

I think!!!

Shetland 2011

2011-10-02T19:47:00.000+01:00

Did some work from dawn this morning on the Wolds and was in two minds were to go afterwards, Pallid Swift a Flamborough seemed tempting, always educational, Spurn was always on the cards as it's ages since I've been and it has to get something soon! And then there was the Solitary Sand in Lancs, a British tick. In the end I ended up having a kip and sorting my pics from Shetland, birding is better in the week anyway cos most of the nobbers are at work!

So here's how Shetland went:

I only had a week on Foula this year and had cautioned myself into not getting too disappointed if it didn't produce, after all we were quite early this year and the last couple of years we've had long spells with no rare birds, in fact the first year we had long spells of no birds at all!

We all met up on the Ferry in Aberdeen on the Thurs evening and old timers Frenchy and myself regaled Shetland (autumn) virgins Aspin and Grist with tales of rarity finding exploits. Actually that's not true we showed them some pics and told them to get ready for a week of fuck all and near mental breakdown, well it's best to not get their hopes up!

When we arrived in Shetland I dropped the virgins at Seafield while Frenchy and I went to Tesco for meat and milk etc and took it to the airport at Tingwall. Frenchy was on the morning flight whilst the rest uof us were going over on the 4pm one. We were quite nervous as we knew the frenchman would be going all out to find something before we got in.

When I met up with the others we set off south for our first target, Pallid Harrier. We saw it but it doesn't look much like one! It had suffered an attack by Fulmar by the look of things and was covered in oil making it incredibly dark, it showed no pale collar between the face and the boa and was generally just black above with rufous covs and underparts. It also had a strange whitish spot on the crown which made it look like a cross between a Marsh Harrier and a Pallid, strange looking bird.

Bit of a mess and not too educational!

We had a walk up the burd and irises at Quendale but found nowt but the other way to the coast had a single Yellow browed, nice scored our first scarce of the trip. Fair Isle was showing welll too in the cracking weather.

Is this the best island in Britain?

I then showed the lads some of my favourite sites including Geosetter from where the Foul Isle was visible. Looks impressive doesn't it?

Many would argue that this is....

When we arrived on Foula Frenchy had already done the biz and found a Buff breast which Gristi was overjoyed about cos I think it was one of his targets. But most intriguing was a bird Geoff Atherton had found a couple of days earlier, a yellow legged stint, we couldn't really do much with it on the camera monitor so Geoff said he would come up to Ristie that evening to get them on the computer.

Our home for the next week

Once we got the images downloaded it took us about 2 seconds to realise it was a cracking Least Sand, and second for Shetland. The Shetland boys would definitely be chartering in for that so we got the news out. Next day Frenchy refound it feeding in rock pools at the south ness and we all got good views. But the boat or planes couldn't come in 'til Monday.

Saturday was otherwise good steady birding, I didn't see anything else rare but plenty of scarce migrants including a Rosefinch from the window of the digs. Bill tried to claim an new Buff breast but maybe it was just one mobile bird, who knows it should have been a second with the number around but we never saw two together.

Sunday the wind swung round to the north east, a direction I'd never experienced on Foula, and it felt rare!

Monster wind direction!

Sure enough the wind produced and within a couple of hours Frenchy and I had scored big with a Pechora. GET FUCKIN IN!!! Back of the net, a bird that was very high on my wanted list for finding. Shame it din't land! we only saw it in flight calling but having seen them in China and on Shetland previously we were confident. A bit later on I scored again jamming in on this highly mobile Arctic Warbler that had obviously just arrived. It was on view for 15 minutes then just vanished never to be seen again!

Thanks to Aspin for these pics

It was generally more of the same for the next couple of days with the numbers reducing day by day. The twitchers finally got in for the Least on the Monday and all went home happy, it's the first in Shetland since about 1955 so a tick for everyone.

We had an influx of observers when Ken Shaw arrived to stay in Ristie with us, actually it was us crashing his booking so maybe we arrived early to stay with him! A couple of days later Kev Shepherd and Paul and Neil Wright arrived for the annual couple of weeks and then Andrew Grieve turned up. Kevin scored with A buff bellied Pipit his second in 3 years which caused a bit of a stir especially for Ken who needed it for Scotland. I didn't bother going to look for it as it was giving people the run around and I'd seen the last one. Bill has some cracking shots of it which he'll no doubt have pics on his blog in due course http://babbthree.blogspot.com/

The birding slowed down a little so I took the opportunity to play with the camera getting some nice scenery shots and playing with a couple of filters I've invested in to get different effects.

I'm really pleased with this rainbow the sky was incredible!

And these two with a slow shutter to blur the water came out nice too

Most of the team on the last morning, Gristi had already fecked off

So here's one of the lone wolf!!

Had another bash at the Least on the final afternoon, here's Frenchy doing the same

Paul Wright called us all up on the radio for a Crake he'd found in the Hametoun burn so we set about trying to nail it, actually we just set about it bastard thing couldn't have been in a worse place. We failed miserably to id it but it was obviously a Spotted/Sora, niggling doubt cos of all the Yanks about made us worried we'd let a big one go but the lads nailed it the next day and it was just a Spotted. It was touch and go if we'd get off due to low cloud but it cleared just in time. Mixed feelings all round really Bill wanted to stay, the lone wolf had to be off to get back to work and I wanted a curry!

Taking a break form Crake bashing

The next day we toured south mainland and found 8 Yellow broweds and a Barred Warbler, Gristi went home followed by Bill and I the next day, but not before we'd seen this cracking Lesser Grey.

More Pecs!

2011-09-30T19:04:00.001+01:00

Hornsea is certainly getting it's share of pecs, what with the lovely pair yesterday and now this!

Note typical Hornsea soundtrack!

I'd been doing a survey all day and then a bit of paperwork at home for a couple of hours and decided to go check Hornsea, don't know why really I knew Mark and Tony had been there all day, so I didn't expect to find anything. I did though I dropped on this whilst mark was stood next to me! And he'd just checked the same muddy edge half an hour before!!!! It just goes to show how you need to be in it to win it!

I've discovered that unless birds are giving views like the girl from yesterday then the video is a much better way of capturing records of birds, particularly if it's windy, or moving a lot, like feeding waders.

Never mind the Sandhill!

2011-09-29T18:47:00.000+01:00

I'm back from Shetland and gutted! I'll put pics of the trip up soon including some of the Sandhill Crane at Strathbeg which we just got before it left to go south. I was hoping to be able to put up a pic of it in Yorks airspace tonight but it was not to be.

When I first heard about it this morning I didn't think it would come south as it seemed to be messing around in Northumberland and not making much progress. Then suddenly it's over Hartlepool and then South Gare and tickable for Yorkshire before I could react! I thought the best plan of attack was to get to Filey or nearby, maybe Hunmanby or Reighton on high ground. I arranged to pick Tim up in Hornsea first and whilst en route got a call form the Mere Birders team with a tip off about a rather pleasing looking young lady with her kit off on the mere edge getting photographed! So a quick check just for clarification was in order! Well nowt wrong with their ID except almost as soon as I got there she put her clothes on!

bit distant but you get the picture!

never seen anyone else except Tony wearing white stillettos walking round the mere!

Anyway we ended up camped out a Reighton for the afternoon but it's obviously landed or gone inland. Fingers crossed for tomorrow.

2011-09-14T17:52:00.000+01:00

Regular readers will know that at this time of year I check a few farm slurry ponds along the coast for waders. This year they've been shit, really poor, the worst I have known them. This is coupled with the fact that some of them have disappeared completely! So I was delighted to find out about some more nearby. I could have found out about them some time ago, about 4 yrs to be exact, but my so called mate has been suppressing them from me in the hope he found something good!!! I reckon he told me out of guilt because I paid his missus (and proprietor of Snazzy Feet, for all your footcare needs) to sort out my feet! I now have superb plates and a spring in my step ready for all the iris beds on Foula.

I was out mountain biking in Dalby forest last sat so missed the semi P at Beacon Ponds, turns out I was in luck though cos I refound it a Patrington Haven on Mon evening, unfortunately the wind was ridiculous and the bird was incredibly flighty so the pic below is the best I managed. No sign of the bird on Tues night but cracking numbers of waders including 15 or so Curlew Sands.

As can be seen in the video below the birds come ridiculously close as the tide pushes them towards the waiting Martin!

Mere Birders!

2011-09-10T19:17:00.000+01:00

Just a bit of a plug for some mates who have set up a new blog for Hornsea Mere. Have a look at it.

http://hornseamere.wordpress.com/

2011-09-06T23:44:00.002+01:00

It's that time of year again when I head north to Shetland in search of some rarities. If you've never been to Shetland I wouldn't bother it's really hard work and the weather is shit, you'd be much better off in Norfolk or on the Scillies!!!

Once again I'll be on Foula although probably only for a week this year, but then I'm flexible I could come straight home if needed for work or stay for another week or so.

Anyway with it getting so close I remembered I hadn't got round to posting the pics from last year due to the computer trouble I had. So here's a few shots, mostly crap, some pretty good, some educational.

Foula was pretty quiet for the first few days, we mopped up on this Pec and Bluethroat on the first day and the Buff breast in the next day or so.

While Shetland was being swamped in rare stuff we had to settle for Barred Warblers and Rosefinches. OK I know the Barred pic is crap but where else are you gonna see two sat together? There were actually three but I couldn't fit them all in the shot!

These two were feeding on the same tiny puddle in an old quarry and were allowing approach down to a few feet.

It was a great couple of weeks on FOula but Easterlies aren't a great wind as mainland Shetland filters out lots of the birds. We had to settle for a Paddyfield (which was originally thought to be a Sykes's Warbler, not by us I add) and a Lancey that only half of us saw.

As soon as we got back onto Mainland Gav stopped me from nearly walking into this Nightjar, a scarce bird in Shetland and we had a Hawfinch at the same site. Plus many yellow browed, at times it seems like they are the commonest Warbler!

We also managed to see the first of two Bluetails, a Sykes's Warbler which was impossible to photograph and plenty of other good birds like this RB Fly and we found a Dusky Warbler. The morning I was flying onto Fair Isle I found this Spotted Sand which was cool.

My First day on Fair Isle was a repeat of last year as almost the first bird I saw was a Blyth's Reed that had just been found, It went missing for several days before reappearing only a few hundred yards from the first sighting.

All in all it was pretty quiet with few good birds, best I managed to find was this Red Kite! They are pretty rare on Fair Isle with about ten records I think.

Even though nothing really rare there were plenty of decent birds around like this interesting brown Lesserthroat and Little Bunting.

Jack scored by finding this OBP and Becca Nason pulled out this Radde's

When I got really bored I started messing about trying to take flight shots of Snedge bunts. And this rather bizarre nominate Treecreeper was well worth a look

The chiffchaffs are interesting too all three of these gave a siberian like call! I've just about given up trying to work out what's what with these things, I just enjoy them for what they are....eastern!

Here's a nice pic of the Blyth's when it reappeared and a Reed from Foula to compare, chalk and cheese!

The second and much duller of the two Bluetails I saw. And below the Izzy Shrike that our Finnish mates Janne and Pottu found.

Continuing the Shrike theme I called for this Steppe Grey at the Loch of Strathbeg when I left Shetland It was just as tame as the Lincs bird from a couple of years back and even landed on my knee whilst I was crouched down photographing it!

That's just about it then, certainly not the number of rares as the year before but still enough to make me go back this year.

2011-08-24T00:18:00.001+01:00

I haven't posted for a couple of weeks mainly cos I've been away doing back to back surveys. The first one we saw loads of Stormy's and a few Sooties but best of all was a mind blowing 400+ Basking Sharks, truly incredible numbers. The second survey was on Orkney and Alison came with me so we could have a few days holiday. We didn't see many birds but went and had a look at all the Neolithic standing stones and archaeology, some of it is really spectacular. We managed to catch this stunning sunset at the stones of Stenness

I played around with exposures and some of the scene modes in the camera and found one that produces results very similar to the Hornsea sunset I messed about with in photoshop the other week.

On balance I think I prefer the first one but the vivid colours would certainly work in some shots. After standing around getting bored by me taking a thousand shots Alison decided to take one with her iphone, I can't believe how well it turned out.......it's better than any of my camera shots!

I also took some shots here in the daytime and I've had a mess about with various effects such as levels in different areas and sharpening it. I wish I'd got the grass right in the foreground more in focus then I could really go to town on sharpening it, but to be honest I'm pretty happy with this considering I'm a novice with landscapes.

It's that time of year again so on Friday I went to the Birdfair with the cus and Pete, we indulged in the usual game of trying to see which stand had the fittest women. This year top prize had to go to the local TV presenter doing a piece to camera outside the In Focus tent, she were a bit of a peach! All the rest were very distant seconds but best of the rest seemed to be the Sri Lanka stand and Viking Optical.

I bought the new North Atlantic Seabirds multimedia guide. The footage of White faced Stormy is very gripping and slightly vomit inducing if you watch it too many times on repeat! Moving boat+moving bird+hand held camera=dizzyness and being sick in ones mouth! I also took the plunge and bought a Remembird so hopefully when the Blyth's Pipit flies over me I'll nail it.

Whilst in the optics Marquee I got talking to one of the guys from Swarovski, very interesting! As regular readers will know I went and had a butchers through all the 80mm+ scopes at Cley Spy earlier this year and found the Swaro to be the best. I want a new big scope but had a slight niggle that the Swaro is the oldest of the bunch and is maybe due for replacement. Well seems I might be right, although the guy said it was only his opinion and he didn't know any facts he thought there would be a new scope at next years birdfair and he thought it would be 90mm+ objective, that's gonna be bright and no doubt expensive. Anyway it's made my mind up to wait and see what develops.

Managed my first visit to Spurn of the Autumn on Sunday and again today, didn't see the hoped for Greenish, they're all in Norfolk, and Northumberland! really could have done with a bit more east in the wind to be good but did see a few Pied and Spotted Fly's and a Redstart, missed the Wryneck by a couple of minutes though.

2011-08-04T00:13:00.001+01:00

Jeez the rain at Hornsea tonight was spectacular, almost as impressive as the Little Gulls, over 2000 tonight.

The rain also dropped a few interesting birds in 6 common, 2 green sand, a knot, a curlew and 2 oycs. Also a Garganey present and I may have missed other stuff as I was sheltering/looking at Little Gulls a lot.

I'm amazed how few people come to see this spectacle, tonight I had literally hundreds of birds fly past me within five metres whilst on Kirkholme point (they stayed open til nearly 8pm tonight, a regular thing on Wed night in Aug) if I had a DSLR that worked I'd have incredible shots.

This was the best I managed before the rain came down

I really wanted to get great shots of adult summer birds and juvs. There's still plenty of time for the juvs, in fact there's only a few about yet but the adults are rapidly losing their hoods!

Lawts has asked me what my set up is for these shots so here's a couple of pics of the centering device I've knocked up.

I covered it in tape cos it was very thin and flimsy but to be honest the only effect it's had is to make my fingers sticky every time I use it!

So how many of the birds on the montage in the background of these shots can you id? I reckon there's about half a dozen that are id-able.

I also had a mess about with photoshop on a sunset from tonight after the rain had cleared, I haven't a clue what the best adjustments/enhancements are for landscapes but this turned out quite striking.

2011-08-02T21:38:00.000+01:00

By the time I got to Hornsea this evening it had clouded over a lot and the light wasn't as good as I'd been hoping for. Also there were very few Little Gulls present by the time I got kicked off Kirkholme point and then I got sidetracked looking for fields of Gulls following ploughs and looking at farm slurry ponds so didn't go back later on. Wednesday night they stay open later at Kirkholme so I'm hoping for better light and more birds.

Here's my best effort tonight, they were a little distant and it was blustery

2011-08-02T15:41:00.000+01:00

Been playing around with the S95 a bit more, I really surprised myself with these shots of flying Little Gulls. OK so they're not brilliant but digiscoped flight shots are a new one on me and with better light/more practice I reckon I could get some good stuff. This camera really seems to deliver much better images at low ISO setting and I had to use ISO800 to get these and have overdone it a bit with the sharpening so will try for better tonight as the light is really good at the moment.

There's a few waders starting to move through Hornsea and the southern edge and kirkholme point look good for something. I've had Dunlin, Ringo, Ruff, Whimbrel, Common Sand (2) and Green Sand the last two days.

Here's a shot of the juv Ruff which dropped in close on Kirkholme this morning

2011-07-27T16:11:00.002+01:00

I mentioned we'd managed to do a couple of days birding on Orkney. It's absolutely full of birds up there even though it was mid summer and is a great place to spend a few days. Whilst we were there we saw loads of Hen Harriers and a few Short eared owls, a Temminck's Stint was a surprise, (it had been seen before but not reported for about ten days) we also saw a stunning summer plumage Slav Grebe, breeding Red throated Divers. Oh and a big cat, no really it was massive, a big black thing, probably not big enough to be a panther in fairness but still massive.

This is the Temminck's, not the big cat!

Best of all on the trip were two different pods of killers, one seen from land between Stromness and Hoy and the other seen close to the boat. I've tried to upload a video of them but it keeps rejecting it! Here's Bill after seeing them.

I think this man is pretty happy!

On the last day we drove down to South Ronaldsay, just exploring really and stumbled across a really amazing looking site. Here's a few pics of the habbo, this place is one of the rarest looking sites I've ever seen, it's almost as good as the gulley trap on Fair isle!

It starts off like this

Gets a bit denser

Gets a bit deeper and the trees more mature

And then is like this!

Here's the thing though, I've never heard of the place! The signpost at the end of the road says Windwick and there's a hut with ringing equipment in it so the place is obviously (well)watched. It's on the east side of South Ron so it must get stuff, it had marked trails running through it so it can't be private so why have I never heard of it? The only two reasons I can come up with are it's known by a different name or the people watching it don't put news out! I know one thing if we are up there in Sept/Oct I'm having a couple of days there

2011-07-26T20:03:00.000+01:00

I was interested to read in Birding World that the Black Duck was reported to show slight Mallard like features and it's suggested it may be the bird from 2007. It's nice to know top birding luminaries such as the BW editorial team obviously listen to Yorkslister! Shame the same can't be said for some members of the Surfbirds forum!!!! How do you add smilies to blog posts?

Seriously though those of you who don't join in on these forums (and I know that's er well nearly everyone I know!) the White billed Diver we had in June has been questioned, actually I was told it isn't one and then it was insinuated that the others we've had this year wouldn't be either! I've dropped out of the discussion on there because it was becoming circular and to be fair I was ready for losing it with someone. The fact is 4 people on the boat saw the bird, 3 of us are, or have been on our county records committees and lets face it although not claiming to be infallible we aren't mugs. So if we get onto a diver with a pale yellowish bill that also shows a brown mealy neck and is massive and in very deep water then as far as I'm concerned it's a case of no further questions your honour. This whole episode just shows how pics can be misleading in some cases, and it seemed that people were basing their opinion on the bill alone when there is so much more to White billed Divers than the bill. Interestingly a couple of my mates whose opinion I respect highly don't think it is one based on the pics, on the other hand others do, including two BBRC members.

Anyway enough of that here's a nice calming sunset with the new camera.

I'd like to start taking a few artistic landscapes, the first thing I want to try is using long exposures to get some blurring into water. I tried on Orkney the other week with some really nice bright green seaweed on a rocky shoreline but I couldn't work out how to do it. I was setting the shutter speed but it kept overexposing, I'm not sure this camera is flexible enough to do this I need to read the manual!

2011-07-26T19:35:00.000+01:00

Got a few posts to put up over the next few days if I get the time. I've been away to Orkney again where we managed to fit in about three days of birding seeing a fair bit of stuff and also done trips to the Western Isles and done a couple of days in the Pennines.

I bought a new camera too, not a replacement for the now completely dead 50D but a compact for scenery and digiscoping. It's a Canon S95 and the reviews I read suggest it's one of the top compacts on the market, well until next Tuesday when it will be obsolete!!
I'm using it handheld and the results are pretty good so far. I've made a makeshift adapter for it to line it up but it still needs holding. I'll be investing in an SRB alignment collar but don't want to go down the route of adapers and cable releases, I like the idea of having this really small camera in my pocket ready to get a good record shot.

Here's a few shots from Hornsea today. No sun at all and just a bit of sharpening and curves adjustment applied. My photoshop skills are very amateur, I've no idea how to use Layers for instance!

I love the summer plumage Adult Little Gull what a shape, it's a shame it wasn't closer/better light.

Anyone interested in witnessing the Little Gull spectacle at Hornsea should plan a trip for August, it's shaping up to be a good year with around 2,000 birds present offshore already. Birds mainly feed offshore and large numbers can be seen anywhere from Flamborough to Spurn. But it's when they come into the mere that they are at their most impressive. Over the years I've seen over 5,000 birds on a few occasions and once saw well in excess of 10,000. If I remember correctly I think the peak that year was near to 20,000. That's a lot of Little Gulls. At the moment they are mostly just visiting the mere in the evenings and early mornings but they should be present more regularly throughout the day next month. The best way to get pics is when they rest on the jetties on the south side of Kirkholme point, with the easternmost one being their favourite. Those armed with a DSLR and a sense of adventure should hire a rowing boat and get out amongst them. Be aware though that at the moment birds aren't really coming into the mere until after Kirkholme is closed for the night so the only way to view is from the fields on the south side of the mere.

2011-07-04T10:26:00.000+01:00

Here are all the pics I have of the Black Duck, I've uploaded them straight from the phone via the laptop so they should be larger files than using the blogpress app from the phone.

2011-07-04T10:09:00.000+01:00

Here's the seabird pics I mentioned earlier, I thought I'd got some half decent Stormy pics but they haven't come out as well as I thought. I had a play around with Bill's 7D with my lens attached and the results are pretty good, it certainly seemed to get focus much quicker and more reliably. The Fulmars Eider and Common Gulls were all with the 7D.

It's a shame these Great northern shots were into the sun slightly because it was so close to the boat they would have looked fantastic with the head exposed correctly so the red eye was visible

Here's the White bill, surely it must be the last until the winter? Unless it's summering! I guess we'll find out next month.

2011-06-27T10:08:00.001+01:00

I've been twitching! I'm not sure I should tell u wot I've been to see, it's a bit embarrassing and more than a bit shit. It was a duck! Not a half decent sea duck or even a mildly interesting diver this was a crappy dabbler and could even be worse than that!

Ok I'll tell u it was a Black Duck. The only reason I went is it was a lifer. I've never been near one. By the time I went to the scillies they'd all gone, I haven't been to Cornwall when there's been one getting seen, up until the last couple of years I'd only been birding in Scotland a couple of times, in August there are seabirds passing Ireland So do you really think I'd be looking a fuckin ducks? Even normal people would rather look for Thayers Gull at Killybegs in Feb/March than go looking for a Black Duck. And well Wales is generally best avoided! I've even managed to dip in the states coz the ones in Texas aren't Black they're mottled (I think, can't really remember cos I wasn't interested then and I'm not now!) and split.

there are two things about this bird tho. The first is I'm not 100% convinced it's not a hybrid. I'm away at the moment and have no literature but the longest tertial does seem to have a lot of pale in it. My phonescoped pics are a bit overexposed in this respect, and a quick search of pics on google does show them to have pale here but it just seemed a little extensive and white. That said I'm probably just being paranoid.

The other interesting thing is the location. About 3 years ago a friend had a Black Duck nr Strontian on the south side of this loch literally within a mile or so of where it is now, can it really have been there that long without being seen since? They are notoriously site faithful when they get over here so it wouldn't be a surprise but surely there must be hybrid offspring around if it has been here that long. Maybe this is one of the original birds offspring? John has pics of his bird so I'll be interested to see them. Here's some pics anyway, any comments on the I'd would be appreciated.

I wa also a bit gutted to see this at the side of the road, it's very small so presumably a young one that's wasnt very experienced at crossing roads!

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

2011-06-27T09:25:00.001+01:00

Since Jan we've had a total of 8 definite White billed Divers on the western isles survey even though none were seen in Feb and we didn't manage to survey in May due to weather. It's a shame May didn't go ahead because it was likely to be a good month for them and should have produced some summer plumages birds. Even though we'd had such good results one this month was a surprise, we thought they would have all cleared off by now. Interestingly it was our first immature bird all the others seen well enough to age have been adults. I got some pics which I'll post later with some other seabird shots.

What was a little annoying was the news that the day after we'd finished and come back to Oban that a Sabs and Red necked Phal were seen from a boat off Mull and a Roller was at Salen nr where we saw the Pied billed Grebe earlier in the year. We normally sail out of Tobermory on Mull but this time joined the boat in Oban, bollocks!

Here's a nice sunset over Tiree

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

2011-06-16T15:59:00.000+01:00

Just got back from the Western Isles where I was doing another survey. Due to using a new boat and some unsettled weather we had a bit of time during on Tiree, a new island for me. It's pretty big vegetation was very limited at least in the area we walked and it is certainly turning up a few good birds even though I presume it must be very underwatched. You can get there by regular ferry from Oban and with the car it must be worth a punt in autumn just look where it is, maybe not quite as far out as Barra but it scored a Parula so anything is possible.

Within a couple of hundred yards of the pier we heard our first Corncrake singing and picked it up very quickly walking along a bank at the base of a fence, it then walked right out in the open crossed the road and stood on the close cropped verge and sang again in full view! We didn't see much else but after out meal in the evening we left the boat again and went back for another look and to attempt to photograph it.

When we got on site it was still singing but from deep cover and things didn't look good. we were just off the road on some grazed grass with a slight height advantage over the irises and longer grass so thought we might get some views. I think it's fair to say we weren't disappointed!

Initially it was in thick cover but soon came out into more open ground and sat sunning itself and gave the occasional burst of song. After it had been on view for about ten minutes it remarkably ran straight towards us and sang out in the open at less than 5 metres! It then flew straight past us across the road, I honestly could have touched it as it went past. It then walked around distantly in the field before flying back across the road and passing Bill even closer than it had me! It landed 100 metres away and running back towards us in short burst in between feeding and singing a few times totally unconcerned that at times we'd been as close as a few metres from it, brilliant. Eventually it wandered off back into the thick irises. I see Corncrakes fairly regularly at Spurn so they aren't the mythical beast to me that they are to some but it really was an amazing experience to be afforded such stunning prolonged views of such a scarce bird.

2011-06-11T13:58:00.003+01:00

When I was speaking to the birders on Holy Island I really didn't expect to be watching a White throated Robin so soon but there was no way I wasn't going to Hartlepool when news broke early the next morning.

The journey up was slightly eventful as I ploughed into the debris from a truck blow out and caused a fair bit of damage to the front of the Honda. The most worrying was the coolant dripping from the underneath, it looked like we might not make it but fortunately it seemed to be from the air con radiator rather than the engine coolant.

When we got there the bird was showing well almost immediately and performed well for a couple of hours before flying into the docs garden. Chaos then ensued as the crowd built up but the bird was missing. The result was well publicised with locals bringing ladders out so birders could see over the high wall.

Did a couple of breeding bird surveys during the week on the Humber and had a day at spurn when I dropped on a cracking Red foot that went south. Pics are on the website

http://spurnbirdobservatory.co.uk/sightings/june11.html

Had another crack at the Robin on the way to Scotland for a survey but it had done it's usual early afternoon bunk so I salvaged something from the day by having an ice cream! When the bloke offered me strawberry sauce he referred to it as monkey blood!! Genius.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

2011-06-07T14:49:00.000+01:00

Had a few days in Northumberland with Alison over last weekend, we camped near Seahouses and had a good time, didn't really get to do any proper birding but had Marsh Harrier near the campsite and a day on the Farnes which was smart, I've been before but the spectacle of the place is very impressive. As usual the camera was playing up making flight shots of the Terns and Puffins difficult. The weather wasn't helping either, Friday had been amazing without a cloud in the sky but Saturday dawned very dull and overcast. Despite this some of the shots came out acceptable.

I just keep wondering how good they would have been given a working camera and sun?

Sunday we had a drive onto Holy Island, I called in here last year on my way home from Shetland (which reminds me I still haven't got round to posting about last autumns Foula trip) but due to time of tides I only really had about an hour to look around. Having had chance for a bit of a walk round now I can say I really like the place. Ok so it doesn't get the birds Spurn does but it's pretty good and the habbo is really nice, I'd love to spend a couple of days here one autumn, maybe with a bit of a crew in a holiday cottage and a few beers on a night, it could be a winner.

I bumped into a few birders who commented they hadn't seen a migrant so although it was easterly and rain didn't seem too likely I'd find much. A couple more told me the best areas to check and we mused over possible species such as Marsh Warbler, Icky and Red backed Shrike. I slipped White throated Robin into the mix....................................little did I know!!!!

2011-05-16T19:38:00.000+01:00

My missing posts have mysteriously returned!! So now it looks like I've been repeating myself! Strange goings on.

One of the lads at Spurn woke on Sunday morning and remarked "north fuckin westerlies, good for fuck all in May". A Tawny Pipit, Bee-Eater, White tailed Eagle and 2 Quail. Not bad for north westerlies!

I got there and went straight for the Pipit, I'd like to say it showed really well and I got this stunning pic

But truthfully I didn't this is from Oman. It showed shite, well it did if like me you opted not to bother with a scope and carry the camera instead. The pic below is the best I could manage of it. Also got distant flight views of the Golden O but little else.

Whilst watching it I heard Mark had had the Eagle at Hornsea (decent couple of days at the mere with thisa and R R Swallow) and Shortly after that Ade had had it over Aldborough, it looked like it was gonna stick to the coast so I opted to get to the north of the gas terminal and pick it up as it came over Holmpton. The flaw in my plan was that the bird flew low to the west of us and evaded detection. Smithy remarked whilst we were waiting for it that eagle eye Adam Hutt would probably pick it up from his position at the seawatch hide first even though we were 3+ miles north of him. In the event he did as it came out over the Humber somewhere to the west of Sammy's. Almost as soon as it was picked up it dropped really low over the water and into the heat haze where it promptly disappeared. It was probably only visible for a minute or so and if you weren't on it straight away you had no chance.

2011-05-14T11:10:00.000+01:00

All I can remember from the missing post or two (can't even remember how many there were!) is that I think there's something a bit suspicious about the Rock Bunting claim from Bolton Abbey. Too many things don't quite add up. The anonymity bit is very strange, the observer has been known to someone at the BTO for 30 yrs and he knows enough to realise the bird was something different, so surely he would know people will want to check the validity of the record! Also the digital image is not available because he doesn't know how to e-mail the pic! I've heard there are people out there that can't do that but I thought it was just hearsay you know like nessy. The digital image is surely crucial if this record is to be acceptable so that the EXIF data can be checked. I'm not saying outright this is a hoax but for the sake of the official record being true then some things really need to be checked out.

Wednesday I had the day at Spurn. Normally I'd have been happy with Nightingale and Red rumped Swallow but this year we just keep getting the birds which is making us greedy. So I was a bit annoyed when shortly after I left they had another Red rump and a Monties!

Thursday I checked Swinemoor but didn't really do much birding, only things present were the Wood Sand and LRP still. So I was peeved when Steve Webb text to say he'd got a Temminck's! Bastard. Serves me right really I only checked it from the road earlier and you can't see the near edge of the pool from there. Mind you when I went down and walked to the pool I couldn't find it anyway. Friday morning whilst back at Spurn Webby texts again to say it was still there! Sodding thing must hide in Rabbit burrows. After returning from Spurn I decided to have a look even though Steve text ten minutes before I got there to say he couldn't find it and bingo found it. All I need to do now is find my own.

I said the other day that Swinemoor needs to be properly managed, here's a pic of it at the moment.

I haven't got any pics of it at it's peak but the dark muddy areas in the right hand side of the frame are normally large pools of open water and the whole area is so wet and boggy you can't walk across it. The place is teeming with Lapwing, it has Redshank and Snipe breeding too plus Yellow Wagtail and Garganey have hung around long enough in the past to suggest breeding attempts. It's criminal this place isn't managed properly.

Back at Spurn on Friday things were very quiet had an LRP and a Wood Saand go south but very few Swallows moving, highlight was just as I'd left a crackly message came through from Adamwhich I could just make out enough of to suggest it was something worthwhile, turned out to be a Monties so I shot back and caught up with it at the Narrows.

2011-05-13T20:33:00.001+01:00

where have my posts from the last few days gone? They were here yesterday and now seem to have vanished, very odd. Can't be arsed to restructure them or to post stuff from today! I'll upload over the weekend, pics of Monties and Temminck's to come, I know you can't wait!

2011-05-12T19:37:00.000+01:00

I decided not to bother going for the Rock Bunt first thing, my logic was that it was unlikely to have hung around for 5 days in spring so I would wait for news. Seems everyone else had the same idea! I got a phone call from Brett at 07.45 saying he was the only person there, that's just stupid, surely some local birders would have gone and checked it out? Did anyone else bother all day or was Brett the only person to go and search?

This got me thinking, if none of the locals have gone do they know something we don't. Lets look at what we do know. It was seen by a birder who wishes to remain anonymous. The only pic in the public domain was scanned from a print. it was sent to the BTO for id. The bits that concern me are the anonymous bit and the scanned print. If you want to commit a hoax recent history tells us birders can be pretty good sleuths, well a print is a sure fire way of making sure you can't be caught out by the EXIF data embedded in the image. As for the anonymity well lets just hope he's not too shy because I suspect the BBRC will want to have a word and see the original digital file. I know I would!

This evening I got a call from Steve Webb to say he'd just found a Temminck's on Swinemoor, arse I checked there earlier today. To be fair I only checked from the road and couldn't see the near edge of the pool. I had a proper walk onto the pasture this evening but still couldn't see it, just the Wood Sand, LRP and a couple of Redshank which I'd seen earlier. It only took me ten minutes to get there after Steve had left too. I guess it must have been flushed or be hiding in the long grass!!

2011-05-11T21:21:00.000+01:00

Rock Bunting!!!!! That would not be shit.

Had most of the day at Spurn today, managed one of the Red rumps and the Nightingale. Other stuff of note was a Hobby and several Marsh Harriers.

Looks like I might be at Bolton Abbey tomorrow with a bit of luck!

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2011-05-10T00:25:00.001+01:00

I managed to do North Cave 3 times last week before I got sick of the place! It's really not my cup of tea, I hate tea, never drink it. I guess it's just not my sort of site. I prefer to wander where I like not walk along a pre-set route and look from hides, they're ok if it's raining. The ones at north cave never even get amusing graffiti or shaggers in them like the Fairburn ones did when I birded there! There is a stage 2 and stage 3 extension to this place planned, more of the same, when in fact initially a landfill was proposed. Now lets look at this, a landfill site next to a series of lakes for bathing with islands and causeways for roosting, sounds perfect and it's the one time when a hide would be useful so I don't have to sit in the car looking at Gulls, and the YWT got it stopped, tossers.

So after not getting out all weekend (too many other birders) I decided on a few hours out today. First stop was Bewholme Hall pond, well if I'm not gonna find a Temminck's I may as well have a look at one someone else has! It wasn't to be, a Wood Sand, 2 LRP and 2 Common Sand where all that was present. I only discovered this place last year, it does look a good little site though, I can imagine it getting a monster one day. Next on to Hornsea where the Spooner was seen but initially nowt else.

Pretty typical view of a Spooner, laziest bird in the world

After I'd been there about half an hour the Spooner flew, no really it did, for about 10 metres then it returned to the same spot. All the nearby ducks (including a drake pintail) didn't though they carried on flying round. The culprit was an Osprey which spent the next hour and a half hovering about but I didn't actually see it try to catch anything. A little Egret dropped in (not a common bird at Hornsea......yet) and a Common Sand calling where the only other birds of note but a good bit of crack with Mark and someone skyving off work who shall remain nameless!

Once back in Beverley I called in at Swinemoor to look at the one remaining puddle the farmer hasn't managed to drain completely yet and was pleasantly surprised to see 2 Wood Sands. It's totally criminal that this site isn't protected in some way, please if someone from the RSPB or whoever is reading get it sorted, not the YWT tho for fucks sake they'll just turn it into another North Cave!

Ok so the pics are shit but they're with the phone, if they were Lesser Legs it'd be job done and it saves me carrying round a proper camera.

2011-05-03T21:04:00.001+01:00

Ok so my self found list isn't the biggest but it's not embarrassing either. There is one glaring omission though...... Temminck's Stint! I know I ought to have found loads but I haven't growing up at Fairburn it was a really rare bird and never on the radar to find really. Since moving to East Yorkshire in the mid 90's they seem to have got much commoner but I've still not managed it. So this week I'm gonna visit north cave gravel pits in the hope of laying that particular one to rest, no luck today though! Did shoot down to Spurn this afternoon for the Sub Alp just for want of anything better to do to be honest. Anyway got there just as Adam pulled it out of a net.

This evening I've been to The cinema to see TT3D- Closer to the edge, to give it it's full title. If you're into bikes you have to see it it's awesome, even if you're not into bikes it's worth a watch some bits might be a bit boring but it's pretty gripping stuff and well made

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2011-05-03T20:42:00.000+01:00

The wind the last few days has been ridiculous, I can just about put up with the wind when birding on Shetland or when it's smacking out of the east and drizzly in Sept/Oct but I find birding in spring frustrating enough anyway with all the leaves on the trees making it harder to see stuff, most days seem to be one bird days unless there's a bit of passage to get stuck into. So it turned out on Sat, I missed a Monty's that went through really early in the morning just as I was getting up and the only other bird of note really was this cracking drake Ortolan.

2011-04-29T22:44:00.000+01:00

With 270 Arctic Terns flying out of the Humber at Spurn today and birds reported from plenty of inland waters it seemed like Hornsea would be a good bet, I was wrong there were none! four had been seen earlier in the day but not by me cos I was watching the Pratincole.

There wasn't much else on the Mere to be honest apart from thousands of Sand Martin but I couldn't pull anything out from in amongst them, so I had an ice cream!

The only bird of note was however pretty smart, this "channel type" Wagtail has I think been around a few days and showed pretty well considering the number of people walking round kirkholme point.

I remember a few years ago, before anyone had invented the term channel wagtail, I uploaded a pic to the Spurn website of a bird I didn't see that was thought to be a beema type flava wag, it seems obvious now that it was one of these.

2011-04-29T15:21:00.001+01:00

After dipping the Collared Pratincole at Spurn last Sunday due to being on the way to the Western Isles I decided to make the short trip over to Immingham this morning where it was refound earlier in the week. It was showing really well at pretty close range being in the air most of the time, unlike the last on I saw at High Eske which was distant and on the ground the whole time. Getting pics was pretty difficult due to the presence of a few hawthorns between us and the bird but with patience some good pics would have been possible, I don't have any patience so had to make do with this pic which is heavily cropped.

Getting pics wasn't helped by the ongoing problem of having a knackered camera, it still takes pics but keeps locking up and giving an error 30 code. I really need to buy another camera body and am tempted with a secondhand 1D series maybe a 1Ds mk11. Then again Bill has a 7D which seems very impressive. Any opinion which would be best much appreciated.

2011-04-28T16:06:00.002+01:00

Just back from another boat survey off the Western Isles. This time last year a friend did this survey and had 3 White billed Divers so after the birds last month and the one in Jan we were obviously expecting to see them this month too. I wasn't really expecting to see as many as we did though. I have to stress that not all of them will be submitted as there was quite a lot of swell making it difficult to keep on them and even harder to get record shots of them. We managed 3 definite birds and another 4 that were pretty likely to be White bills but the views were just not quite enough to submit a description for.

Here's a couple of them that Bill Aspin did manage to nail with the camera

This bird stood out at about 700 metres with bins the bill was so obviously long and pale

Even though it was close (about 250 metres) this one wasn't easy due to the light conditions. We had 3 other birds like this including 2 together but Bill couldn't get anything with the camera to make them worth claiming.

Ken Shaw and Andy Carroll who have pretty much been instrumental in re-writing the status of White billed Diver have told me in the past that they like deeper water than Great Northern, based on birds they have found in spring from land on the west coast of Scotland. BWP states that the usual depth for Great Northern is probably around 4-10 metres but that birds have been caught in nets up to 70 metres down. Being on a boat with all sorts of electronic gauges we've checked the depth for Great Northerns and although it's only a small sample size they seem to be in water up to 25 metres deep. The White bills however, including all the probables have been in water between 36.7 and 46 meters depth. If the probables were all White bills that's a sample of 10 birds this year in water with shallower areas nearby that they appear to shun, we've also never seen one with a Great Northern, they do seem to keep apart from one another. OK so it's not Martin Garner's Birding Frontiers blog but it's all interesting stuff.

2011-04-20T18:40:00.000+01:00

Didn't realise how long it is since I last posted!

I forgot to post up the pics of the White bills from the last western isles survey so here they are. All the pics are copyright Bill Aspin.

This bird was pretty distant, Bill has cropped these pics out quite a lot but it was still distinctive enough at almost 500 metres to pick out with bins. Note the really thick based neck which is obvious given reasonable views. This one held it's bill up at an angle and looked brown even at this distance.

Closer this one and easier to pick out on the brown colour alone, note again the very thick set base to the neck. We see over 100 Great Northern's on this survey every month and they never give this impression on power in the neck. This bird didn't hold it's bill above level so this is if a bird isn't it doesn't mnean it's not a White billed. They should be in Summer plumage by next month.

Bill also got this stunning pic of a Peregrine, it's awesome.

2011-03-30T13:22:00.000+01:00

well another week and another trip to the western isles, this time Tiree where we found 2 more White billed Divers (bill is gonna send me the pics when he sorts them out). These two were great because after the one in Jan we both said we could have overlooked it a a distance so it was educational with what to concentrate on, it's not the bill with bins on a moving boat at distance trust me. Both of these birds were over 300 metres away so I was really chuffed to nail them.

We managed almost a full day birding on Mull after the survey and saw the usual large numbers of Great Northerns, some slavs, a Red necked Grebe Bill found this in early march, it's a description sp for Argyll and it hadn't been reported since giving some idea of how well watched Mull is! We saw a pair of WHhite tailed Eagles at the nest from the boat and good prolonged views of a Golden. As usual Otters were fairly easy to see including a really obliging pair that I managed to video. I used the iphone for this just held up against Bills Kowa 883 with 20-60 zoom I tried to focus using the phones screen but didn't quite nail it so the vid isn't quite sharp but it's still pretty good. Trouble is it's too big to upload and I've no idea how to compress it so can't stick it up.

We also saw the Pied billed Grebe and I tried the video on that but focused with the scope first I think this is really impressive for a phone!!!

2011-03-24T08:56:00.001Z

Just got back from the western isles where I saw Sky, egg, rum, cannae and muck without managing to set foot on any of them! I am however a fully qualified ESAS surveyor, does that make me an expert in my field!
Saw a massive dog Otter an adult White tailed Eagle and about half a dozen Bottle nosed Dolphin riding the bow wave of the boat everytime it came into or left Mallaig harbour.

A couple of pics of canna

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2011-03-20T23:55:00.001Z

Spurn bird obs now on twitter. Follow them @spurnbirdobs

Think that's how you find the feed anyway!

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2011-03-20T00:10:00.001Z

It doesn't look any fuckin bigger to me!

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2011-03-18T10:47:00.001Z

Here's a few maps to some of the sites we visited. You might have to zoom out a bit but the green arrow should show the general areas I'm trying to point out.

View Larger Map

This is the area where we saw Brown -throated Sand Martin, other teams have dipped on this since the outer parts of the river became saline.

View Larger Map

This site is one we stumbled across. The man made reservoirs with overflow pool, in spring this is probably a brilliant migrant trap. The scrub along the river had a few Scrub Warblers.

View Larger Map

Probably not worth putting this one in but this is where we had Rock Martins in 2006. Doubt they will be regular here but anyone passing might want to have a quick scan. Then again I reckon the hirundines will be mobile so any of the other rivers the road crosses could hold them, we've seen Crag martin further north in a similar area.

View Larger Map

We weren't allowed into the port at Tan Tan Plage, it seems a bit hit and miss gaining access. However we did see lots of Gulls just outside on the beach including lots of Audouin's. Many of them were ringed and presumably from the Ebro colony in Spain. Towel and Gristi took some ring details but don't know if they're received anything back yet. We stopped at the 3 river crossing between Tan Tan Plage and Akfennir abd saw a few more Audoin's and a few waders but nothing really special. One of the sites had about 500+ Common Scoter offshore which we were surprised to see this far south, just goes to show you're always learning.

View Larger Map

Lastly I'm putting this one in just to show the size of the place, If you go to the Kniffiss Lagoon and want to tick Kelp Gull I'd say you need to get a boat out to the island otherwise you are looking at a massive distance and really would you be happy ticking them? I wouldn't. The marker is the island where the birds breed, you view from the south side next to the barely visible building!

Morocco

2011-03-17T13:29:00.000Z

In the past I've been away at xmas a few times, it's shit loads more expensive but gets me out of having to sit at my sisters with screaming kids and family I hardly know all day! Actually the real reason is when I had a proper job I had to use 3 days of annual leave over the xmas period which pissed me off so me and Gristi used to go away so we didn't lose any of our holidays.

We've done Morocco before, in 2007 and it was fantastic so decided on a return visit. This time Towel (Rael) Butcher and Blue (Pete) Wragg made up the rest of the team. We flew manchester to Marrakech with Thompson and hired a Fiat Punto which was too small in all honesty but being xmas cost about 3 million quid! Honestly some of the other Spurn lads went a month beofre us and got a Land Cruiser sport for about a hundred notes more than we paid!

We booked digs for the first couple of nights over the internet and then just found them on the day for the rest of the trip. We paid no more than a tenner each per night and everywhere we stayed the rooms were fine. To be fair as long as they had beds and warm water we'd have been happy.

The trip was essentially a re-run of the previous visit with us doing the mountains around Ouikimaiden, the coast around the Oued Souss and Oued Massa, the desert areas around Golimine and as far south as Tan Tan Plage and Kniffiss Lagoon.

It's been too long since we were there to remember all the funny little anecdotes, which probably means there weren't any! So here's a few pics instead.

Light wasn't great in the mountains with a lot of cloud and some light snow flurries but I was quite pleased with this Crimson winged Finch which came fairly close. Most of them were a bit distant for a DSLR

Love these thingsthey really are stunning, they just look right. Surely only Azure and White Headed Long-tailed are better.

Mahgreb Magpie are pretty smart looking too much slimmer and with less white than our own, bet they still eat all the small birds tho!

Funny isn't it how some trips are so different despite being the same? The last trip to Morocco we didn't see these at the Massa and only jammed them whilst checking a reservoir for drinking Sandgrouse. This time they were everywhere in the hillside above the Oued. Sitting right out and singing, They always seem to manage to position some vegetation between them and my lens but I'm still really pleased with these pics.

I really like this area at Goulimine, we've cleaned up each time we've visited. This is the first time I've seen Trumpeter Finch here but you get a lot of Hoopoe Larks and some large flocks of Lesser Short-toed with smaller numbers of Short-toed, Desert and Bar -tailed in with them. We've managed a few Thick-billed each time as well.

Desert Lark, note the long dusky bill, whereas the Bar-tailed below has a much shorter more conical bill that is very pale giving it a cuter face.

Also when it has a good stretch like this you can see the clean cut tail band, this I find really hard to see as they fly past, as many birds do here as they seem to move between fields constantly.

These Thicky pics are from 2006 taken with my old Canon S2 so the quality isn't as good as it could have been with the 50d but they didn't show as well this time.

Just south of the desert area for the larks we visited a dryish river bed, in 2006 it was really good holding a few Spectacled Warblers and Red-rumped Wheatears, this time all we saw were a couple of Southern Grey Shrikes. Some serious amount of water had gone through here at some time recently and lots of the bushes were trashed which was probably the reason for fewer birds.

In 2006 this site also held a small flock of Crag Martins and at least 2 of these. Rock Martin isn't supposed to occur in Morocco according to some trip reports, I've got a series of pics that seem to prove otherwise

Just south of the Goulimine town we found a man made reservoir with a overflow at one end which had formed a pool. We had Ruddy Shelduck, and a few waders here mainly Kentish Plover and Little Stints but a few Green Sands and a Common Sand too. In the scrub to the east were a few Scrub Warblers but the best was this superb Lanner which flew across the road carrying what we assumed was a Desert Rat, it then landed on the nearest pylon and ripped it apart, cracking bird. Lanners got much commoner as we went further south with us seeing them at most sites south of Goulimine.

Down at Kniffiss lagoon we were hoping for Kelp Gull, well I was at least the others couldn't have cared less! However after sitting looking at an island with a couple of piles of stones on it and willing the Gulls to be what I wanted we had to come away saying they looked like Great-black Backed or were too far away for us to do them. So when Birding World landed on the doorstep the other day I was heartened to read the article suggesting that Kelp Gull is only present during the summer months. The Caspian Terns were nice though.

On the last day we found some really nice agricultural land further inland from the sea at Massa where it's freshwater (the sea has breached the mouth of the river turning it saline and it's much degraded for birds on previous years) and had a cracking afternoon, it's a shame we didn't find it sooner as we'd have all been happy spending at least a full day here. I took literally thousands of pics of these to get the ones here but I reckon they're some of the best pics I've taken with this camera. Other birds here were Glossy Ibis, Marbled Duck, Bonelli's Eagle, Black-shouldered Kite and Brown-throated Sand Martin.

2011-03-12T19:17:00.002Z

First visit of the year to Spurn today, we've all been doing various management work tidying the warren repairing the heligoland etc. Nathan and myself were busy putting a new fence in the church field around the pond so the sheep can graze right to the waters edge which will hopefully make it more attractive to pipits and wags.

Because of all this work I didn't get much birding done but had Merlin and a cracking drake Pintail go over and had the Whooper flock at sammy's

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2011-03-11T16:11:00.000Z

Here's a few pics from Orkney last week, wish the light had been better especially for the Lond tailed Duck and 3rd w Iceland they would have been excellent with a bit of sun. Well they might not actually I still couldn't get the Eiders sharp even with good light, I'm just shit!!!!

2011-03-10T22:50:00.005Z

Spent all last week on Orkney doing a couple of surveys, bit quiet not much to see but got about a day and a half to do some proper birding.
Spent a lot of time checking offshore looking for Scoter hoping for a surfer, didn't manage it obviously but saw a few Velvets plenty of Slavs and GND's. Had a couple of Icelands got a few pics but best of all was a cracking drake Long tailed Duck on the peer sea at Kirkwall, I'll upload the pics from the camera later but for now here's a nice pic of the old man of Hoy from the ferry home

Spent a bit of time looking for the northern bullies and bearded seal but as usual failed miserably, I don't think I'm ever gonna connect with that bastard seal.

Also good was the flock of Greenland Whitefronts at the loons RSPB reserve and a single with pinks at tankerness. I've only seen this race once or twice before.

Not really tried to use the new phone for pics through the scope yet but had time to fire off this one otter shot at tankerness, it's the only one I've seen on Orkney

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2011-02-22T19:05:00.001Z

I mentioned earlier I'd heard the key to a successful blog was to update regularly. So I've downloaded an app so I can easily do it from my phone. This is just a test really to check it works.

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2011-02-22T15:16:00.000Z

I've just heard something on the radio suggesting that to have a successful blog you have to post on it regularly so here I am.

Last week I got the urge to go do a bit of twitching, don't know why I bothered it pisses me off but I had an offshore survey cancelled (like they've all been this month!) and with the relocation of the Oriental Turtle Dove in Chippng Norton and access being sorted for the Tuesday but not looking likely for the rest of the week I decided to give it a go.

So Tuesday saw me picking Towel up and off we set, I think he must have been pretty excited about seeing this bird as when we got there I found this little accident on the car seat! He denies it saying it was water but........

When we got there the bird had shown but had flown off all sorts of rumours were flying around about a guy from the local paper/BBC/News of The World/British Birding Association (delete as appropriate) hiding in the hedge between 41 and the next door garden and flushing it. Who knows what the real story was but the result was it didn't show. At it's peak I reckon the queue must have been 600 strong so we didn't join it instead preffering to walk round the neighbouring streets, it was pretty cold and miserable though so by 4pm we'd had enough and cleared off. It was back the next morning, bastard thing I hope it gets eaten by a cat.

I am glad I went though because I overheard the funniest thing I've heard for ages. Lee Evans had just come up to me saying he thought I didn't twitch anymore and what had dragged me out for this bird when a couple of blokes came up who had been checking the nearby streets.

It went something like this........

"Hey Lee"
"Hi"
"we've just been looking in the next road"
"Oh yes"
"Yeah there's some Collared Doves and Wood Pigs coming down to a birdtable"
"Really, Where's That"
"well you go left at the top of this road and then left and left again"
"OK great, what's it called"
"Webb Crescent...........oh you might not want to go down there!"
"silence"

Absolute genius

I messed about at home on Wed and Thurs when I should have dropped everything and set off for Rainham for the Slaty-backed Gull, I didn't though so the urge to go for it got too much for me so Friday I was off. I decided to go fro the Dove again on the way down as it seemed to be showing better in the mornings.

I arrived just as Mark Thomas stuck his head out of the door saying it's showing in the garden and we'll start letting people in. After about 20 minutes queuing I got in and had pretty poor views of it in a fruit tree for 5 minutes of so, it was a bit distant to get much on with bins and was partly obscured by branches.

I quickly left to let others in for it and went up the road to the garden where you could look down on the garden it feeds in and got pretty good scope views for about half an hour. It was always partly obscured but you could piece together all the features as it moved around.

Although I've seen them in China I was surprised how pale the tail tips were on the underside, especially the newly replaced partially grown ones.

So after scoring my first new bird of 2011 I set off for the Gull. Bastard thing I hope it gets botulism. There were a couple of claims during the day but it seems they were both single observer jobs and nobody I spoke to was believing them. I nearly went to Pitsea on the off chance but decided against it as I had no idea where the birds roosted at this site and knew the tip couldn't be viewed so I elected to set off north and beat the traffic. It was back the next day and unbelievably on the Sunday too. I might go back if it starts to settle into a pattern but I'm not holding my breath.

2011-02-07T18:39:00.001Z

I've received some more feedback on the Gull in my last post from a very well respected and knowledgeable guller. Basically he suggests it could be a very dusky lbb! He goes on to say he's seen one bird this dark before. I'm very open minded about this bird to and it could well be a lbb, I've certainly never seen one like this but that doesn't mean they don't occur. To be honest we don't get many of them around here in winter, in fact we don't get any, maybe the odd bird but they mostly come back in late Feb/March and then mostly adults so I'm not too familiar with juvs in mid winter. I did think it looked like a 'northern' Gull though with a frosty appearance to the head and underparts and fully Juv scaps and mantle, I wonder how a late fledged northern bred intermedius might look?

Finally got off my arse the other day and went to see the Northern Harrier in Norfolk. Here's my best efforts.

The light was shit and it was windy as hell making it impossible for someone of my dubious photographic ability to hold the damn thing steady, I really am getting sick of the whole camera thing I'm shit at it! Mind you my stuff is better than the crap Robin and Pheasant pics Towel and Jack took whilst my back was turned, fuckin camera saboteurs!

Despite the terrible pics you can see how distinctive this thing is. The most notable thing being the dark oily upperpart tone with rusty covert patches ( I didn't get a shot showing the uppers tho) but the peachy belly with limited streaking confined to the breast band and axillaries and the hooded effect were all obvious enough too.

After the Harrier we went to Cley seeing a Rough leg en route and the septic Wigeon. The rest of the lads went to see the Shorelarks on the beach whilst I went to look at Scopes at Cley Spy.

I was surprised that the Cley Spy shop at Cley visitor centre has none of the top scopes in stock and you have to go to the other shop in Glandford where you can look at no birds and one Oak tree, it is a very nice Oak and to be fair probably offers a good subject to test how the scopes resolve detail with it's gnarly bark.

Anyway once there I got the Kowa 883 20-60, new Zeiss 85 20-75, Leica 82 and the Swarovski HD 80 both with 25-50's all lined up. The first thing which struck me was the yellow cast on the Zeiss funny thing is I have a 65 Zeiss and have never noticed it. Later I compared it to Jacks Swaro 65 and it's definitely there, in isolation you don't notice it but it's really obvious in direct comparison.

Anyway back to the big uns. The other 3 are all pretty neutral in colour with the Kowa being the warmest. All 4 of them showed some colour fringing when looking at branches etc against the sky but I've never used a scope that didn't show this and don't notice it unless I specifically look for it. The Kowa seemed brighter than the others with the Swaro a close second and the Leica third, the colour cast on the Zeiss made it look the dullest.

When I looked at the Zeiss at the bird fair I couldn't get it sharp and commented on turdborem about this but nobody else had experienced it so I was looking forward to trying it again. Well I still can't get it sharp sorry but this scope is a bit crap, so is the Leica to be honest with a washed out image and very fiddly focus due to no depth of field. The problem is the depth of field, it's too narrow, even at the low end they are much narrower than the Swaro and Kowa, but wind on some mag and you'll spend more time fiddling with the focus trying to get a sharp image than looking at the bird.

I reckon you can get caught up in the minutiae of optics performance and lose sight of the bigger picture. A scope has to be comfortable to use and the Swaro and Kowa are just that. They both have large ocular lenses with good eye relief and the Swaro in particular has a massive depth of field which means it is in focus with no fiddling back and forth on the focus wheel.

I then tried the 30x Wide lenses on the Swaro and Kowa and Zeiss (although the Zeiss lens was second hand) the Leica don't do one and so as it was pretty dull and very fiddly to get sharp I handed it back to be packed away.

The Zeiss still had a massive yellow cast and although brighter and much easier to get sharp than the zoom it has a very narrow eyecup which is much less comfortable that the others so I handed that back leaving just the Kowa and Swaro to fight it out. To be fair it's not much of a fight with the 30's on as the extra 8mm of the Kowa really comes into play and it gives the Swaro a bloody nose. It's a gorgeous piece of kit sharp as a tack unbelievably bright and I prefer the focus wheel position as it allows you to steady the scope whilst focusing with one finger.

So the Kowa wins does it? Er no actually if I was buying one with a zoom the Swaro wins hands down, it's bright and sharp maybe only a percent or two behind the Kowa in this respect but the extra depth of field making it much more user friendly and the huge ocular making it just feel right from the off. Then again although I've got used to a zoom I really like the 30 wide on the Kowa.......decision decisions!

2011-01-30T13:27:00.000Z

The day before Mikes stag do I was shocked by the discovery of what appears to be Britains first Slaty backed Gull. Those who know me well know I'm a bit of a Gull bore so this really fired me up to get out to the tip and find something of my own.

I wasn't expecting this though!

This thing I found really interesting but unfortunately as soon as I clapped eyes on it it promptly sat down and stayed there for 40 mins. I couldn't move the car to a better position due to the layout of the road, i.e. a fuckin big roundabout next to where I was! So I took a couple of phonescoped shots and started sketching it. As I was filling in the scap pattern the whole flock flew and I couldn't relocate it. I showed the pics to a few people and they thought the same as me that although a bit on the dark side it showed features of a Juv Thayer's Gull!!!! I went back to the tip 5 out of the next 6 days before I had to go north for work but it didn't show up again. Obviously I can't claim this bird but it certainly looked interesting.

So trying to banish thought of Gulls from my head I ventured north for a get together of ACE Surveyors in Pitlochry, it was a bit messy with a couple of very late finishes in the bar, but it was good to catch up and meet a few new faces.

I called in at Rainton meadows on the way up and bagged a single Arctic Redpoll it was a bit distant for the DSLR though

Still a bit worse for wear on the sat morn I ventured to Slammananaman, or at least that's how it looked to my eyes, I'd still been in the bar at 5am! I'm too old for this shit!!! After a bit of searching I got onto a flock of about 80 Taiga Beans, good to get a bit more experience with these as they are often claimed in the county but very seldom do they make the grade, most being Tundras. I would upload a pic but my stupid phone has decided to start saving pics to a folder on the main memory and the computer can't access it for some reason.

Which also means I can't upload a pic of Dan blindfolded and trying to pin a wig on a Haggis! And he wasn't even drunk.....

Got to do a couple of days birding during the week as the boat survey I was on was interrupted due to bad weather which was good as we saw 3 Otters and some of these bad boys.

Plus loads of Great northens and a few Slavs. Bird of the trip though was this fella, fortunately seen about 5 minutes from the end of the survey so we could finish off and turn back and have a good look and get some pics. We've been hoping for this all winter so it's good to finally get one, should be a good chance of getting summer plumage birds in the coming months too.

2011-01-17T23:32:00.001Z

Apologies to anyone bothered about the long gaps between posts, truth is I just can't be arsed, winter is shit I've seen fuck all for months!

Actually tha'ts not quite true I have seen the Rough leg at South Ferriby and the Ring billed at Mirfield plus on my travels had some ace views of Common Dolphin riding the bow wave of the boat. I also went to Morocco at Xmas for 6 days which I'll post about later with plenty of pics.

This last weekend saw Mr Pilsworth have his stag do in Scarboro, a decent night was had by all, except John Hewitt who was sidetracked by the Slaty-backed Gull at Rainham. For those that aren't sure about how to do them this guide is indispensable www.freewebs.com/punkbirder/slatybacks.htm If I said I agreed with this nobody would believe me but I reckon it's probably how John is feeling!

Anyway back to the stag do nothing too untoward happened, PC got lost on the way back to the hotel and by the look of his jeans managed to slide about on his arse in lots of mud and GS got lost between ale establishments and wandered round every pub in Scarboro for 2 hours 'til he found us. We must be getting old ten years ago every stag do I went on was complete carnage!

Here's a couple of pics of the groom

BEFORE

AFTER

AND A FEW MINUTE LATER STILL!!!

At least it gave the dirty bastard Turnstones something to scoff!

I've managed to get my Shetland stuff from last autumn off the old deed laptop so at some point before spring will upload a few bits about that with a few nice pics of some rare(ities)!

2010-11-08T10:21:00.000Z

It's been a long time coming! After a couple of (well three actually) people asked when I was going to update this I thought I'd better post something. Actually come to think of it I wonder if those three are the only ones reading this!

Well the reason for the lack of updates is mainly that I was away on Shetland for a month and whilst up there my laptop died, along with notes I was going to use for writing this and most of my pics. I will be able to get them back but it's taking time. I'll write something about the Shetland trip later in the winter when there's fuck all else to do/see.

Since I got back I've been out to Spurn a few times and been doing some counts on the Humber but not seen a great deal, a few Waxwings and a conti Coal Tit are about the best of it.

Flamboro has hit gold again with the Brown Shrike, maybe It's just a case of grass being greener but they do seem to be aceing Spurn the last few years. I've got no figures to back this up but my gut feeling and I think the general concensus is that Spurn gets more birds but as a local there we get the same old species all the time like Radde's and Booted's. Flamboro keep getting the quality like Olly's and things from a long way east with Brown in the name! Apart from the Baillon's Crake and a couple of Swifts in the last few years the last truly good bird off the top of my head was the Grosser. We do seem to be competing a bit more with seabirds tho now they've stopped reading Harrison before each seawatch.......

I suppose like everyone else I'll have to comment on the Twitching programme last week I though Brett came across as slightly mad (but we all know he is anyway) but as a proper birder and really genuine, the others came across as a brown nosing johnny come lately and a mad egotist but overall I thought it was highly entertaining.

As for the idiots on birdforum saying the treatment of the young Craig girl deserved attention from social services I'd like to ask what fuckin planet are you really on, I've never heard such utter bollocks.

2010-09-15T22:57:00.002+01:00

Although I love seawatching and have over the years done loads of it but I've not really connected with any good blows in the last few years. The only good day in the last few years was on North Ron last year when we had over a hundred Sooties and a Great Shear. The last good day at home I was in a meeting in the morning (when I had a proper job!) by the time I got to Spurn the last 2 of about 50 Leach's went past and then it dried up! These were the last Leach's I'd seen so with hot gen coming through from Gav at Seaforth saying 'it was happening' I decided to have a ride out to New Brighton and Leasowe this aft.

Bloody hell as I pulled the car up a quick scan with bins revealed about 10 birds in the river off New Brighton, a more thorough scan and I'd have said there must have been 30-40 birds but they're reet hard to count. After about an hour with only one or two coming reasonably close and one flying over land! I decided to try Leasowe, good move as soon as I arrived birds were moving west close in along the waters edge so I got huddled down among the concrete breakwaters and had spectacular views I was tryting to photograph them rather than count them but there must have been 50+ went past in an hour and a half, some of them as close as 3 metres from me and too close to follow with the camera.

I got hundreds of shots like these which I'd call good seawatch views

I was finding it really difficult to stay on the birds and the closer they were the harder it was. This next one was probably a bit closer

But it's these I was really wanting, the sun came out and suddenly some of the closer ones became a little easier. Still couldn't follow the stupidly close ones though.

I learnt something today......Petrels are bloody hard to photograph even when ridiculously close, ok so I had the wind to contend with and dull light and a camera that I keep having to turn off and then on again to make it work. But even after all that I still reckon they're tricky, just think how hard it is from a boat, well if it was a White faced Stormy I reckon I'd try my best..... Madeira wind birds here I come, might have to save up for a 1D series body and a 300 f2.8 first though!

2010-09-09T11:24:00.000+01:00

The weather looked good and the charts had seemingly whipped everyone in birdforumland into a frothing frenzy of anticipation of birdguides reporting rares all down the coast, so I set off to Spurn.
I actually set off twice because I forgot my radio the first time so was half an hour later than I'd planned. I spoke to Andy Roadhouse on the way down who told me there were plenty of birds around and a Wryneck at wire dump and a new Barred Warbler at the Warren had already been found in the first half hour, best of all though was an Ortolan at Sandy Beaches, things did look good.
When I arrived I headed straight for Sammies, one of my favourite areas and likely to be a spot nobody had yet checked. I bumped into Adam Stoyle on his way down the road and we set off through the bushes, it was alive. I'ver been lucky enough to catch some of the biggest Sept falls at Spurn in the last 20 yrs and this one looked promising, Redstarts and Pied Fly's everywhere flava's and Tree Pipits going over and Wheatears and Willow Warblers constantly dragging attention between bush and field. Then the radio crackled into life, Roadhouse had a Spotted Crake in the point dunes, and hop along Hutt had 2 Rosefinches in the church field, others were at the Warren and Wire Dump making a total of 5. We pushed on trying to keep a tally of numbers when Adam came back on the radio with a Red rumped Swallow flying round Kilnsea and Roy Taylor came on with the cryptic message about a large pale Bunting at the point suggesting it was a bird Andy had seen briefly earlier, it resolved itself into an Ortolan. There were birds everywhere, I got back to the car after about an hour and a half and decided to go to the point.
Where have all the birds gone? The bushes had some stuff but nothing like the tackle hueeting and chacking away from every bush at Sammies, after an hour I head north to try Beacon Lane, again more of the same just a few birds, enough to keep you expecting but not the numbers of earlier. The rest of the day was spent doing Easington, parts of Kilnsea less often visited and Sammies again. Best birds were a Firecrest and a fleeting view of a Wood Warblers arse.
Wednesday looked like it too would turn stuff up so off I set again, this time radio firmly in hand and fully charged, I forgot my bins! I had to borrow Pete's spares, a massively heavy pair of Nikon high grades, nice optically but only 8x not the 10x I'm used to so every phylosc looked like a plain leaf! And I've put my back out carrying them round all day, if I owned these I'd need a Tim!
Bird wise it was more of the same just less of them, I tried half heartedly for the Ortolan and had a look round Sammies for the mass halucinated Red breasted Fly, got questioned for the second day running by the anti terrorist police round the gas terminal, so about 22 hours in the field and very little in the way of scarce and nothing rare to show for it.
I suppose what this tells you is don't look at the bird news services and think Spurn (or anywhere else really) is lifting with birds on days like this. Do't get me wrong it was good and I believed I could find a monster, of course those from birdforumland will undoubtably see more by running round chasing everything reported on the pagers some of it they'll see some they wont. I prefer to draw a blank but know that I did my own thing and next time it might be my lucky day

2010-09-05T20:22:00.000+01:00

I said yesterday I didn't wan't to talk about the Olly anymore, well I don't but I do want to have a rant about it! I've just got back form the Brown Flycatcher where I heard from very good sources that a certain old school Flamboro supressor photographed the Olly 5 days before it was found by Craig Thomas but thought it was an Icky. If he wasn't such a small minded selfish twat and told other people about what he'd seen maybe someone else would have gone to see the Icky and the penny would have dropped and I'd have seen it. The fuckin big nosed suppressing bastard!

As for the Brown Fly how early is it?

Yeah I know it looks like a pied fly cos it's so overexposed, it was phonescoped.

2010-09-05T10:44:00.002+01:00

During the spring I was lucky Savi's Warbler and Iberian Chiffchaff the only birds I needed for the county hung around long enough for me to get back for them.
Last autumn I went north to Orkney and Shetland for the month knowing that the same period in 2008 would haver cost me Brown Shrike, Pallas's Gropper and Amur Falcon. I only missed Baillon's Crake which most others did so it's not guaranteed I would have seen it anyway.
So it's feckin frustrating that this week I've missed Collared Fly and Olivaceous Warbler, ok so the fly is probably gonna struggle to get through but the warbler is nails. I'm a bit gutted and don't want to talk about it anymore!
So I got back home at 2am and was in bed waiting for news from Flamborough when Tim rang to say he'd got a Booted Warbler at Grimston, some year he's having! As it happens he managed to get access sorted as there was a stubble field suitable for parking and the bird could be seen from this field or the farm track. It showed well for the first 30-40 people who got there but then went to ground.

Tim did well getting access arranged for this bird as usually when he finds anything good the answer from the landowners is no, hopefully they'll be more inclined to say yes in future as people stayed where they should apart from 2 individuals who wanted a piss and and were too bashful to lob it out in front of the few women present and 1 who simply wanted to know if we were there yet and be the first one to see the sea!

Just before I ventured north I had a look at the Crane at Bewholme, seems to be a regular early autumn occurrence having a Crane somewhere around this stretch of coast! I'd been sitting in the car for over 2 hours waiting for it to get closer and all four birders that had pulled up for a look stayed in theirs too. Slowly it was edging towards my end of the field. But then a well known import to east Yorks from the Doncaster area pulled up and got out at the other end of the field and stated to scope it. Seeing him out of his car the very next car that pulled up the driver got out grabbed his camera and virtually sprinted to within 100yds of my position, the bird understandably looked more nervous and after a while obviously thought fuck this I'm off and flew to Bewholme Hall pond, these are therefore my best efforts! It's called fieldcraft boys, some of us have shit loads of it, others don't!

2010-08-23T00:10:00.000+01:00

Shit how many people in Britain have found Sharp tailed sand? Well one of my oldest birding mates just found his second in 3 years tonight! That's pretty impressive, surely he must be in a club of one.
It was a mad dash from Spurn to Patrington Haven reallignment site dodging various farm machinery that seems to be littering the queens highway at every turn lately, should queen have a capitol Q, you know out of respect? When we got there John had lost it as a dog walker on the top of the bank flushed the waders up. After an agonising 20 minutes or so it reappeared. I say agonising because I kind of hoped it had fucked off, having been lucky enough to see Johns last one I didn't really want this to hang around for all the other top boys to grip back but the bastard did!
The bird showed for about an hour or so before flying off as the tide started to drop but it was never close.

It is in that pic honest I've put a mark in to help all you birdforum regulars find it!

2010-08-22T23:58:00.000+01:00

Went to the Birdfair on Friday with Gareth and Towel. Had a good walk round and saw loads of people I don't catch up with very often, had a good butchers through all the big scopes with a view to buying one later in the year and pissed myself at Towel getting all starstruck over his hero Johnny Kingdom.

he was so exited after meeting Johnny he spent

mucho $ on a Gitzo pod!

The only thing I bought was the new advanced ID guide by Nils van Duivendijk it's brilliant what a superb concept, it's like having Killian Mullarny's memory in your glove box! I knew this was coming out as Jim was involved in helping Nils get it published in Britain (the Dutch version has been out for about a thousand years) so was eagerly awaiting it, lets hope iot comes in useful on Foula this year.

Those of you who haven't been to the Birdfair it's class there's about 8 marquees to look round before lunch and a few pints in the bar then another 8 to look round afterwards. The highlight is usually the hot women on the tourism stands from various countries. This year however I reckon top spot was taken by either the barmaid in the beer tent or the Cameron Diaz lookalike on the Subbuteo books stand, with an honourable mention to the peach from Andalucia birding. Roll on next year.

2010-08-22T23:37:00.000+01:00

Been a few birds about on the mere in the last week or so, saw the White winged Black again but it didn't come close enough for any pics, this Arctic did though.....just!

A few Waders about too but nothing outstanding. A flock of 12 Red crested Pochards is pretty disgusting, I'm just thankful I didn't visit the western end where there's a Ruddy Shelduck! Mind I'm doing a load of counts on the Humber at the moment so it's surely only a matter of time before I stumble across one of them, there's at leat 1500 Shelduck on every count.

2010-08-21T15:13:00.007+01:00

Spurn must be one of if not the best site for Booted Warblers in the country, I've seen half a dozen there so surely we must have a chance of Sykes's? It's probably not sound logic to be honest so I went to Druridge on Monday to see the one there.

It's a bird I've read up on many times but have never been able to put it into practice (apart from one bird seen in Oman) so I've struggled to get the features nailed. I was therefore really surprised to see this bird and find it so obvious, obviously there may be a slight element of it already having been named but I approach every rare bird I see by trying to find reasons why it isn't one, I couldn't with this it really was distinctive when seen well.

I watched it for about 3 hours (it wasn't showing for all that time but I did get prolonged scope views as it fed in rose tangles a couple of times) before getting the camera out.

As you can see the results aren't the best so it's a good job I'd drawn it, I'm not putting that up here though!

2010-08-15T22:50:00.006+01:00

What a crackin weekend, got to Spurn on Fri night and managed a couple of hours seawatching. It was a bit steady considering the strong north westerly wind but I suppose it is a bit early yet, saw 3 Sooty's, about 25 Manx and a few Arctic Skuas.

Sat and the wind had gone round to a promising north easter and almost immediately it was obvious it was having an effect with a few Pied Fly's and lots of Willow Warblers, I didn't chase any of the stuff but managed to see the Red backed Shrike, a Wood Warbler and a Black Tern. There were Icky and Wryneck around too.

A quiet night in the pub meant an early rise so I ventured south, 15 minutes after getting to Chalk bank I had to turn round and race back to the Warren where Mike Pilsworth had found Spurns 2nd Citrine Wag. Mike used to find stuff all the time but since becoming on of the Wardens at Blacktoft where he's found hardly owt we've been tellin him he's a spent force, looks like he's back tho after this and last weeks Semi P!

After havin my fill of the Wag I returned south and saw an Icky at the point and a few common migrants.

News came through mid morning of a juv White winged Black at Hornsea so late afternoon I went up to see it, and it's a little corker giving stupid close views. Despite the camera being fooked I managed a couple of shots I'm happy with, which is no mean feat when the feckin thing locks up after every third or fourth shot and I have to turn it off and on again before continuing!

Looks like a trip to Northumberland might be on the cards tomorrow, I've only seen Sykes's Warbler in Oman and they're probably a future split in waiting anyway so it will be educational to see the one up at Druridge bay if it's still there in the morning

2010-08-12T21:48:00.000+01:00

I've added a link to Martin Garners site Birding Frontiers, I'm sure this will develop into a proper site about birds and we'll all learn from it unlike most of the ones in the list! Although if he sees more than me in Shetland this autumn I'm taking it off!!!

Had a butchers at Hornsea tonight, the water level is stupidly low and a few waders are using the edges 2 Greenshank, 2 Redshank, a Ruff a Dunlin and an LRP plus a few Little Gulls, I didn't look for the Ruddy Shelduck or Red crested Pochard cos they're both a bit shit!

2010-08-11T08:35:00.007+01:00

How long is it since I last posted! The reason, I haven't been birding since mid June, well not for pleasure anyway. I've been mega busy with land based and offshore surveys mainly in Scotland but also been to the south coast too.

We were on a boat off Sussex when news came on the pager about 3 Lammergeier that had flown out to sea from France, we looked at the sky a bit more than we had been up to that point but if they came over us it was too cloudy to see, the fact they weren't picked up anywhere else suggests they turned round. Why don't we get any rares on the boats I go in when the spawny twats on the Dogger bank ones are turning tackle up nearly every trip!

Was off the Western Isles a couple of times in the last month and saw a hundred or so Stormies each time so hoping for Wilson's next month. But the real highlight of this trip is the number of Basking Sharks, we've seen over a hundred each time, some are so close the boat almost hits them before they move and if the light is right you can see right into their mouths, fantastic things.

Last week we were on Orkney and had a few goes at the Bearded Seal, still no luck, I reckon I must have been to that pier in Finstown about a dozen times now and dipped, I'm not even that bothered it's John who keeps going on about it! We also dipped on the Alpine Swift twice but scored Great Yellow Bee which is apparently rare as fuck and something else John keeps banging on about.

Had a bit of luck with the Drags too seen Downy Emerald on a couple of occasions and a superb drake White faced Darter all at Loch Garten. One of the Emerlads was stuck in the water with clots of mud on it's wings and couldn't get out so I rescued it with a stick and put it on some veg to dry out so got amazing views of it. Eventually it flew off so I got a nice warm glow from having done a good deed!!!!

The camera looks like it's going nowhere they are still refusing to do anything about it. I'm not happy!

Saw my first good bird locally for ages yesterday when Ade found a Dotterel in a field at West Carlton.

2010-06-16T10:56:00.005+01:00

I've been meaning to buy some sound recording equipment for some years now, typically I've not got round to it. I've also got the sound approach books but have never really sat down and read them and learnt about sonograms and all that stuff. I should have really because for the last few days I've been involved in trying to nail Yorkshires third Iberian Chiffchaff, and capturing it's calls and song on a phone, no matter how smart it is, isn't very easy.

It all started on Sunday night whilst I was watching the Germans play fitba (too much time in Scotland, where they don't seem to play fitba, or Football for that matter) when Tim rang to say he had a prob Ibe Chiff at Grimston. I went through and heard it singing and calling and it all sounded good the bird giving a downslurred reed bunting like seeuu call and a song with 3 component note types 'chiff chiff chiff swee swee swee der der der der, however as it was quite late in the evening and it was raining it wasn't as vocal as we'd have liked so we agreed to try again the next morning.

Monday morning was bright enough and the bird was singing almost constantly, it also called at least 15 times. We saw it well at distance through scopes and managed to record the song so it all looked sorted. Trouble was when I got home the song hadn't come out well at all on the videos I'd taken due mainly to too much wind. So we were left with our notes on the plumage and our written transcription of the song, not really satisfactory.

I went back in the evening and had loads more attempts at recording it but still found most were poor. We needed to get the bird closer to the phone so I played a bit of song and then the calls from the Andreas Shulze recording to it and hey presto it came to within 5 or 6 feet of my head and started shivering it's wings and calling a lot, for the next ten minutes it sang it's head off moving from tree to tree in a display flight with it's tail half cocked and it's wings fluttering. I've never seen a bird respond so convincingly to a bit of playback. Another interesting point is that at times it's withing 15 metres of a pair of Chiffchaffs which are nesting but they have never once sung or engaged in any territorial disputes with it so they obviously don't see it as a threat.

I managed to get one or two recordings where you can tell what it is but I still wish I'd got round to buying that parabolic dish and mic!

These are probably the best bits of song I managed but you'll have to listen carefully, the first burst starts at 33 seconds and then just at the end of the vid.

As most of you will have seen from pager reports most of the areas Tim birds at Grimston are private and he alone has permission to work them. This bird is half a mile from the nearest public footpath or road and surrounded by trees so there is no chance of seeing it unless access is allowed. Tim has asked if the owners will allow access but they have refused. Fortunately there shouldn't be anyone upset by this decision as the well twitched bird is still present at Potteric should anyone be desperate to see one. Better not to push for access this time when the bird is no longer important and save it for a really big one we think.

2010-06-15T15:41:00.004+01:00

As usual I've been up in Scotland a lot and when I have been home there's not been much to see down at Spurn. I did manage to see the Savi's at old moor the other week which was a welcome grip back as I was the only one in the top ten in the county who needed it. And as a bonus has put a bit of breathing space between me and the lads in joint tenth. It showed really well too, these pics were phonescoped!

Just River to go for the set in the county now, surely it must be due a re-occurrence?

2010-06-15T12:38:00.000+01:00

My camera has packed up, it keeps locking the shutter and saying error 30. If I turn it off then on again it works but it's not perfect. So I took it back to Jessop's and they sent it off for repair. After a couple of weeks I got an estimate for repair for £447!!! Obviously I wasn't happy as it's still under warranty. So I'm on the phone to Jessop's who tell me the repair agent (Thomas photographic) say it's due to it having a hard life and being knocked heavily or dropped and give me the number of the repairer to contact myself. When I rang them they tell me it's due to corrosion inside, so it appears they can't make up their minds. I was on the phone for about ten minutes and this guy's saying I'm not their customer so they won't deal with me and I have to go back to Jessop's, anyway I must have annoyed him by being persistent as he hung up!!! I'll keep you posted, expect me to get annoyed and swear a lot before this is sorted out!

2010-05-21T18:55:00.004+01:00

I'm not into superstitions and all that stuff but I think this weeks events have been a bit odd. First on Monday for no reason other than there was nothing on tv I watched Control, even though at the end it tells you the date Ian Curtis dies it didn't register, then on Wednesday I watched 24 hour party people, on Thurs I saw the cover of NME and realised it was 30 yr anniversary of Ian dying this week. Then today as I'm reading it I found we were both born on July 15th! Strange or what.

Anyway here's a couple of videos. They're not all live footage of the band cos there's not much of it around.

2010-05-18T14:48:00.009+01:00

Went back up to Scotland on Sunday 9th for 7 days, the plan was I'd do a couple of days with the lads and then shoot off to meet another crew for a boat survey off the Northern Isles before another couple of days on the mainland. I've wanted to sea Killer Whale for a long long time now and thought I was gonna have to spend a couple of weeks in Shetland in July or go on an organised trip to see them so to see these amazing things just left me speechless. We reckoned the male was about 8-9 metres long, or feckin massive!

There were six of them and they hung around for about an hour, as you can see in the video below they weren't shy! the one in the vid came as close as 3 metres from the boat and actually twisted her head to look at us!!!!! At one point they caught a seal (I think) and ripped it apart, one of them twatted a lump about two foot long with it's tail and sent it flying through the air. It was unbelievable.

Dan has found out since that they are a regular pod in these parts but have also been seen in the Faroes.

Whilst I was enjoying these Yorkshires second Iberian Chiff was being twitched by all the keen Yorks listers, it wasn't long before I was getting texts and phone calls. Ha as if I was bothered about some poxy phylosc with a dodgy voice, they all seemed to see my point of view.

After the euphoria of the killers it was back to normality for a couple of days. I managed to see about 100 Great Northern Divers, a few migrant Dotterel and an Iceland Gull over the course of a few days. Then it was back to the mainland were I had a climb up a mountain on one of the sites, it's the third time I've done this site and at last I connected with Ptarmigan, and a pretty embarrassing lifer finally bit the dust wappo. The only British breeding sp I still needed!

On the way home the car decided to have a bit of a fit and ran out of petrol even though the gauge refused to drop below a quarter and the computer said it had 25 miles left in the tank! Fecking thing, after pushing for a mile and then getting a lift to the next services we finally got going again at 1am. Bastard cars. As you can imagine Adam was over the moon and his usual jovial self!!

Anyway back at home and playing it ultra cool I finally got to Potteric for the Chiff at about midday, it was duly wapped off and I'd had two tick in two days, 3 in a week if you include the Orcas. To be honest I was pretty struck by the Chiff it was far more obvious on shape and plumage than I expected, that said I'm still on a high from the Killers, the only bird I've seen that beats them hands down is Needle tail and I'm struggling to think of any others that compete so I can't get that excited about a phylosc that has hardly any stripes!!!

2010-05-18T14:39:00.004+01:00

After Scotland it was a week down a Slimbridge doing some data analysis work, I didn't get any birding done cos the reserve shuts at 6 and I had a bit of work to do to my car, the brakes had just started to grind on the way home from Scotland so I got some Ferodo racing pads to replace the EBC green stuff ones I had in it. Don't get me wrong the EBC ones were good and probably more than your average driver needs, these new ones tho are in a different league I just can't believe how much more stopping power they have. Mind you they'll probably wear out in half the time and eat the discs in the process.

2010-05-18T14:32:00.002+01:00

Been mega busy since my last post so seen plenty of Eagles, Kites etc. Went to the Caper watch at Loch Garten one day and had distant views of a male and 2 or 3 females but not seen a lot else.

I cocked up the other day whilst sat reviewing paperwork in the car I left the ignition turned on and killed the battery, I flagged down a bloke in a people carrier who said he had some jump leads but he wasn't gonna get them out of the boot cos he had a fridge and.....wait for it........a parrot in the boot!!! A fuckin PARROT!!! the twat I was gobsmacked, he pissed off and left us sat at the side of the road. We eventually got going after the local garage came out with a starter pack and it fired up instantly.

2010-04-23T18:40:00.008+01:00

Just got back from a boat survey off Wales, amazing didn't hear anyone singing all week!!

Managed a couple of hours at South Stack one day and had a smart drake Ring Ouzel, it was getting kicked about by the local Blackbirds which surprised me, I thought they'd be more aggresive. Also there were about a dozen phyloscs, mostly Willow Warblers but a couple of Chiffs and an obvious northerly passage of Swallows I wasn't counting them properly but about 300 or so went north.

Whilst out on the boat we had 40 Bottle-nosed Dolphins that followed us playing in the pressure wave from the boat they were so close you could hear them clicking at each other, absolutely amazing animals one of the best things I've ever seen, these pics don't do them justice. In fact I struggled with the camera as they were a bit too close for the 300mm lens!

The following video taken by my mate Cooky is a bit long but shows the views we were getting really well.

2010-04-18T11:54:00.005+01:00

I haven't had it confirmed yet but I believe Brian Fendley didn't see the Ring billed the other month, which means I may still be joint 9th. I can't see it lasting long though to be honest as it's looking like I'll be out of the county a lot this spring.

I'm also worried about Tim Isherwood catching me so arranged for him to come and do some surveying in Scotland last week. I figured getting him out of the county was a sure way of him missing owt that turned up.

It nearly fuckin worked too but the putative Harlequin possibly sounds like it maybe wasn't probably one............allegedly!

Saw some good stuff whilst away, Eagles and Hen Harriers every day, Crippling views of Black throats in full summer attire, lekking Black Grouse, no Crested Tits tho which Tim wouldn't shut up about! I reckon he might secretly need them.

This beaut was one of a pair that were quite close to where I found a breeding pair last year, lets hope they're back for another go cos they failed last year. I've been told Black throats desert very easily even when the young are well grown, in fact it sounds like Shannon Mathews was better cared for than the average Black throat chick! Fingers crossed for them this year.

I know this is a shite pic but it was snatched as we bumped into these having a right go at the side of the road, now I know where they lek I'll try getting a less obscured position for some more shots next time I'm passing. I'll also be trying for some nice Eagle shots, at one of the sites we surveyed the landowner puts out Deer carcasses for them, seems like you can get quite close.

2010-04-03T10:54:00.002+01:00

Jeez I've been busy, I've not actually done any birding for about a month, well I have cos I bird for a living but not any proper birding when I do the what I want when I want sort of stuff. I have however been on a boat for a few days, been to the highlands and Slimbridge and flown a few times. I've seen Golden Eagle and a few Hen Harriers, a Med Gull, lots of plastic duck type things and not much else, my migrant total for the year is 1 Sand Martin, 4 Swallows, 1 Wheatear and 1 Chiff, oh and the Black Red which seems so long ago it feels like it was mid winter!

The obs is now back open after all the renovation work and a lot of painting so I'll be there in the next few days so should get some proper birding done then.

2010-03-08T22:43:00.007Z

I hate dog shit! The first field at Hornsea was covered in the stuff today. Makes me really glad they're not allowed on Spurn, sod the bloody ground nesting birds what about the soles of my trainer. I reckon the owners who don't clear it up should be made to eat the fuckin stuff.

Anyway, back to the birds. Saw the Brant again and 24 Barnalces at Spurn on sat, the thief is still hanging around and as any one else noticed how obvious Barn Owls are at the moment? I saw them 6 times on Sat.

Sunday Towel and me went looking for Gos' we saw 1 shortly after arrival very distant but then nowt just a load of Buzzards and a Sprawk. Although we did have a Herring Gull called out by one bloke as a Gannet due to it's white underparts and black wingtips! Maybe it was a Snow Goose! Did a bit if dudeing after and saw the usual suspects at Forge Valley and a drake Mandarin in Hackness lake then about 5 Meds at Holbeck.

Not much to speak of at Hornsea except a Slav which seems to have been there since early Feb but I'd somehow managed to avoid hearing anything about it.

2010-03-05T16:23:00.004Z

Spring is here- it's official.

Well the one migrant I've seen so far seemed to think so anyway. Spurns first Black Red of the year was a whole month earlier than the earlierest one last year.

Other stuff included distant views of the Black Brant, 42 Pale belied Brents, 2 Shorties and a Blue Chicken Thief! One of the Shorties and the Thief were at Welwick saltmarsh with a Merlin.

Sunday was a washout with heavy rain all day so I birded from the car for a change, and saw 2 White fronts at West Carlton and 2 at Tunstall plus a total of 14 Pink feet, I missed the Crane and the poss Green winged Teal and despite spending most of the day under a nice tin roof still got soaked.

Had a couple of days flying mid week and managed this with the phone, I'll have to get a proper lens for this sort of thing.

I've been relegated, perhaps twice, seems fitting as a Leeds fan! There's a new Blog in town and it's swearier and generally more offensive than this one. I'm not sure if I've ever met the author as I was away for most of last year working or on Shetland but he recently started to bird Spurn and made me laugh so I've added Q@Spurn to my blog list. The statistical analysis of likelihood of Gulls getting some food by flying round making loads of noise chasing another Gull raised a smile, be warned though he's a fuckin sweary fucker!

I'm still clinging onto the slim hope that Brian Fendley didn't bother going for the Ring billed Gull cos if he did I'm no longer joint ninth, I'm relegated to tenth, and with Tim Isherwood just as fanatical about his Yorks list as me, and now only one bird behind, another spring walking round Scotland counting Golden Plover could be costly.

2010-03-02T21:29:00.000Z

I was doing some survey work on the Humber last week and drove past the RSPB reserve house for Blacktoft in Whitgift. I don't know how many of you are familiar with the house but you will all know the road through the village, so, what I'd like to know is why the fuck have they put up a big red STOP sign at the end of the drive? Can somebody tell me, please.

It's surely the biggest waste of money I've ever seen and just typical of the stupid nanny culture that exists these days.

I reckon if you pull out of a blind drive into a road without stopping to have a bit of a look for other traffic then you deserve what's coming your way. In fact if there was no sign we'd get rid of all the numpties that need to be told to stop and we'd all be a lot fucking safer for it.

It really pisses me off that they've basically wasted someone's yearly membership fee on this and I'm glad mine lapsed a few years ago cos I don't want to support an organisation that puts so little value on it's members that it's prepared to spend their money on this shite.

2010-02-24T12:05:00.008Z

Well Tuesday was my last day in Holland and Jim had some work to do in the afternoon so we planned the day around me finishing with some Gooses action nr Rotterdam.

First though knowing my addiction to buying outdoor clothing Jim took me to what must be the biggest outdoor shop.....................................................................IN THE WORLD (that last bit should be read in the style of Clarkson).

It's unbelievable, it took us about an hour and a half to walk round it, they stock everything, even stuff for proper expeditions that I didn't even know existed like down lined boots for wearing in the tent when its about -300. I somehow managed to refrain from buying anything at all which I still can't quite believe, Jim bought a pair of down lined mittens which looked good, and apparently keep his hands warm, judging by how cold mine were later that day I should have maybe bought some too! Although judging by the prices trying stuff on then sourcing it back home here would be a better bet, a Mountain Equipment jacket was £80 more than it sells for here!!! Anyway here's the website if anyone fancies a nose. http://www.zwerfkei.nl/

Just round the corner from this shop was a big lake which had an American Wigeon on it but we couldn't find it despite looking for about 5 minutes. As time was getting on Jim had to set off for his survey site so we said our emotional farewells and I headed to Rotterdam.

Once in Rotterdam I quickly found this

And a couple of these

The Buffleheed has been returning each winter for about the last 4 or 5 and sometimes shows really close to the bank, obviously it didn't this time.

From here it was a short drive to the site for Lesser White Fronts which were in the exact field Jim had told me they would be in, also here were about 20 unphotogenic Buzzards and millions of Barnacles and White fronts. Jim had said there would be Great White Egrets in the ditches next to the tracks at this site, well they aren't great and they weren't there either!

Within 10 minutes of arriving I'd connected with about 60 lessers which got flushed pretty quickly by two women on hosses and then all the other gooses started to drift off so with almost 2 hours of light left there was nothing to see! I made my way back to the ferry terminal and had a kip.

So 4 days winter birding in Holland,I think you'd have to say it's a pretty good list of tackle. I really was surprised by how good the birding was it's such a small country as well that we covered most of it in the 4 days and I've almost forgotten about my experience on Texel, it certainly beats birding in Britain in winter, I was even impressed with the Gooses!

2010-02-22T21:33:00.013Z

These next two are for Jack!

I've never seen an adult male Rough Leg before so this was a really nice bird to catch up with. Amazing how dark it looked with the head and breast merging into the underwing covs and mottled belly. When seen sat it was striking how big the shoulders and head looked compared to Common Buzzard, a right monster of a bird.

After the rough leg which was nice cos we could watch it from the car Jim made us get out and walk round a big wood where you apparently get some birds. We didn't, and it was freezing, more freezing than I've ever been even with 3 pairs of good gloves on my hands were cold after about 5 seconds. It was also the quietest wood I've ever been in, it took ages to find the first bird, a Marsh Tit I think, I can't be sure cos my eyes had frozen and I couldn't see! We also saw Crested Tit and Short toed Tree but none of them showed very well they were all moving around a lot frantically looking for grub. It was below minus 5 with a wind chill that must have been minus 25.

Right then here's the good stuff.......

Nice 2nd cal Caspian

And a few of a smart Mich.

The tip here is fantastic the rubbish is all dumped on a concrete area surrounded by walls. The Gulls just sit on the walls waiting for the trucks to move off then it's chaos. There is a bank adjacent to this tipping area you can stand on, the views are incredible as the birds are only 20-30 metres away. If it hadn't been so cold my hands would have been a bit steadier and I might have got more sharp pics. Although on the other hand it might have been the 8% grog the night before!! No on second thoughts it was the cold, Jim bottled out and went to sit in the car for the last hour pretending to be tired, think he lived down south for too long.

In the evening Remke cooked us a traditional dutch dish of malaysian curried rice or something! Which was really good and we went to a pub quiz, which was in Dutch! despite the obvious handicaps of Jim, who's been learning Dutch for about 18 months, and me, who doesn't speak a word of it, we came second by one point!!!

2010-02-22T15:41:00.006Z

I should have said earlier that I was in Holland over the weekend of 6th-9th Feb

Here's a few Goose shots, it might be a while before I add the next day, it's when we went to the tip. I've got a lot of pics to sift through!!!

2010-02-21T20:06:00.014Z

After a few really good dutch beers last night we had a leisurely start this morning and headed to the Baikal Teal in the east of the country (well I think it was east) lets just come out and say it looks plastic as feck on a canal with various hybrid Mallards and such like.............but there's also Gadwall, Pochard and Tufted Duck on the same canal, and everything but this canal was frozen just a few days earlier so who knows.

I'll say one thing about it wherever it's come from it's an absolutely cracking looking bird. At the same site there were Middle spotted Woodpecker and Hawfinch calling but we couldn't see either of them.

I'm really amazed how much I enjoyed all the Gooses in Holland, I'm not really a goose kind of birder but out there you can't fail to be impressed there are literally thousands of them everywhere. Next on our agenda was an area with thousands of Tundra Beans. In with these birds is a massive one which had been mooted as a middendorfi which I was keen to see, we didn't but found a pale bellied Brent instead, which is rare. We also had a Great white Egret here.

Then it was onto what for me was bird of the trip, the Oriental Turtle Dove. I've seen the race orientalis before in China, they are massive Wood Pigeon like bulky things. This though is a meena and if I'd seen this at Spurn in Oct I'd have overlooked it as a Turtle Dove so I was really pleased to get a bit of experience of this race. Jesus it was cold though!

After the Pigeon we went for a bite to eat in a dirty bastard stinking fish restaurant, I had chips and a burger surprise or something! Lauwesmeer in the north was almost empty of birds, we did have the most ridiculous views of a Bittern tho as it sat on the roadside next to the car before being flushed by a cough!!!

Today I learnt that the literal translation of the dutch name for Hen Harrier is 'blue chicken thief' which I love I think we should start calling them this all the time it's class. Also saw Black Woodpecker today fly over the motorway in front of the car! and tens of thousands of Barnacle Gooses. A few more cracking Dutch beers were consumed including some at 8%!

2010-02-21T19:03:00.004Z

It's been a while since my last post, after getting back from Holland I've been flat out for the last week and a half, plus I've been getting my laptop updated (cheers Darren).

So anyway Holland.....

Last year I went to see Jim, it was mostly for a party and we did very little birding, we did however go to Texel (pronounced tessel, think of nipple) where we saw a Snedge Owl and sod all else but horizontal rain, it was without doubt the worst days birding I've ever had. So when Jim told me the weather forecast was for rain I was overjoyed, Gooses and more fecking rain......sweet.

I arrived at the ferry terminal to be greeted with gorgeous bright fog, and set about trying to find my way to Eindhoven without a map, where Jim was going to meet me to look for Crested Lark (his idea not mine). After only one wrong turn I got to the station which was bathed in blue skies and sun and met up with Jim who immediately pointed out a black guy who appeared to be feeding the ducks whilst facing a stone wall!!!

The Lark was seen within a minute or two and then we set of for Maastricht to look for Eagle Owl.

The Eagle Owls are in a disused corner of a massive quarry that's been allowed to scrub over and viewing isn't easy with only a few good vantage points, the first point we came across had well worn earth so we had a look, there were some blokes in the bottom making some noise so we didn't hold out much hope and Jim walked off in search of a better place to look from just as he did a maseeve Owl flew across the quarry, I couldn't see where it landed from my position but the racket the corvids made for the next 10 mins gave us a good idea, despite searching though we couldn't see it. We went to look at some Gooses and saw 3 Red breasted and lots of Barnacles and White fronts. We returned to the quarry later but there was no further sign despite staying til dark.