Look Back Not In Anger

What with the festive season and the impact of ice bound Britain it looks like I may not get out birding for a day or two. So until then and in order to keep Another Bird Blog simmering I have picked some highlights of 2010, dug out pictures old and new, mainly of warmer days and relived a few memorable moments, the odd notable day, with a few personal favourites. I scanned through photographs that I keep in folders in alpha order; Animals, Buntings, Chats, Ducks etc - you get the idea. The problem was I found so many to share that I may have to do this in two or more stages.

The year kicked off with a windy spell and an Eider that got blown onto Knott End foreshore but recovered well enough for a photo shoot on release as it sailed majestically for the safety of the open sea. What a gorgeous duck!

Eider
Knott End

2011 had its share of cold weather too, and being into birds isn’t just about our feathered friends but also an appreciation of all animals and the natural environment. Stoats are such magical little wild creatures that when a photographic opportunity presents itself it becomes a privilege to capture their image.

Stoat

I seemed to spend most of the spring, summer and autumn getting up at silly times to go ringing on Rawcliffe Moss where our ringing efforts contributed to a record finch year for the Ringing Group of Redpolls, Siskins, Chaffinches, Goldfinches and Greenfinches, then later in the season, Reed Buntings.

Dawn - Out Rawcliffe
Roe Deer at dawn
A Ringer’s Work Is Never Done
Siskin
Lesser Redpoll
Chaffinch
Goldfinch
Reed Bunting

A spring break in Menorca was a chance to photograph a few local specialities with a Turtle Dove posing, puffed up on a cool Mediterranean morning, or a Scops Owl surprised by a flasher in the darkness.

Turtle Dove
Scops Owl
Menorca
Back home it was already the breeding season and time to ring a nestling or two.

Little Owl
Curlew

Before we knew it a busy autumn arrived, birding bonanza time when waders, warblers, pipits and chats abound and when I enjoyed a few memorable photography sessions in wonderful light with Swallows, Wheatears, Meadow Pipits and others.

Sedge Warbler
Little Egret
Wheatear
Swallow
Meadow Pipit

That’s all for now and it is a small selection, but if anyone has any favourite species for the next or indeed any time, I am open to requests.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank all the people who contributed to the success of my blog this year – critics, supporters, contributors and commentators. I hope that everyone who joined in so gained as much interest and enjoyment as I did from simply keeping the blog alive.

To end here is a sad but true tale - I spoke to a bloke the other week who recently retired from work and is bored, doesn’t know what to do, just follows his wife around like a lost puppy and thinks he might look for a job; I offered to take a couple of days a week off his hands.

PS, I wish everyone a Happy Christmas and prosperous New Year, but remember................

Happy New Year

Home Alone

It was another Rawcliffe Moss ringing session this morning. I went alone as Will is up in Scotland standing in a river, where allegedly he will catch a salmon or two but I thought I was on pretty safe ground to say that this week I will catch more birds than he will fish.

It nearly didn’t turn out that way because the morning was a quiet one. Firstly the Meadow Pipits of the last three or four weeks dried up more than a little and we could now be past their peak migration which usually takes place in the last two weeks of September before numbers tail off through October. Even the Chaffinch didn’t appear to be in very high numbers this morning although the fine, clear sky meant that most travelled over at great height, often audible but impossible to see against the bright blue sky. On “vis mig” I counted only 20 or so Meadow Pipits and 100+ Chaffinch, all birds north to south.

But I caught all the target species with 15 new birds, 2 Reed Bunting, 1 Meadow Pipit and 12 Chaffinch with zero recaptures once again.

Reed Bunting
Chaffinch

The highpoint of vis this morning was alba Wagtails again with a minimum of 15 over, all heading south, plus 2 Grey Wagtails, 3 Lesser Redpoll and 4 Tree Sparrow.

In the plantation all was fairly quiet save for the roving tit flock which thankfully kept clear of the nets, as did a couple of Jays. Another loud, fruity toned Chiffchaff was near my nets for a while but didn’t get caught today.

Other birds this morning, 2 Buzzard, 1 Kestrel, 2 Grey Partridge, 50+ Skylark, 30 Goldfinch, 15 Linnet, 4 Reed Bunting and a Sparrowhawk.

There were a few animal highlights today in the shape of several Brown Hares, three Roe Deer and a Stoat which came for a peek at me as I sat in a quiet spot having a coffee.

Brown Hare
Roe Deer
Stoat

I took a peek too - at the weather forecast for the week ahead. It looks like birding only for several days ahead. If Will catches 16 salmon I’m in trouble!

Déjà Vu

I snuck out for an hour or two this morning to Pilling when the girls went shopping to Poulton on the bus. Kids nowadays just travel in cars and Olivia was so excited at the prospect of going shopping with her Nana it was a joy to watch Olivia's face as she stood waiting in anticipation for the number 2C to appear.

As I jumped out of the car almost simultaneously looking out to the marsh I got the unmistakeable thought that I had been here before when I saw a Marsh Harrier fly from the Cockerham direction, then left and west towards Pilling Water, just as it or a different one did on Saturday. Not content with that identical entrance, this one also went a long way into the distance, off towards Cockersands. If it's the same bird as Saturday’s I guess it heads west and then circuits the marsh out near the tide line but stays around the general area; if it was a different bird then it sure was a coincidental encounter. But local patches can be like that with birding days much like another.

When I arrived at Pilling Water the fine but wetting heavy drizzle had already started. Nothing new there then, so I sat under the big elderberry tree that gives a little bit of shelter plus a view over the marsh and outlet but also in both directions along the sea wall.

As I looked left towards the gate a few alarm calling Swallows alerted me to a Stoat that ran along the rocks towards me, and as Stoats do it stopped and peered at me before it went on its way. I frequently see Stoats here, I’ve even seen one swim the width of Broadfleet as the tide came in, but it’s not always they let anyone get too close. They make a living from the local bunnies and ducks around the pool but I think the lack of successful Meadow Pipit and Skylark nests in the immediate area has more than a little to do with the cute but deadly Stoat. Near the gate I watched 2 Wheatears and a Meadow Pipit dispute the best lookout post as they switched between the gate itself, the barbed fence and the metal rails of the sluice gate.

Stoat
Wheatear
Meadow Pipit

I settled down as best I could on the uncomfortable, damp rocks looking for the harrier which I didn’t see. Instead I saw 2 Peregrine, a brownish juvenile and a more striking adult, both sat on the distant marsh before each went their separate ways after a few minutes sitting in the pouring rain. A Kestrel flew past close by and veered off quickly, it initially hadn’t seen me under the tree. Along the outflow I could see 2 Common Sandpipers, 2 Pied Wagtails, 1 Grey Heron and 1 Little Egret and then further out a Greenshank triple called, but by now the visibility was so bad I didn’t see it. With the rising tide there were lots of Curlew and Redshank flying back and forth, but in the conditions impossible to count precisely.

Grey Heron

I heard the Hi-fly quad bike in the pools, duck feeding time which had the effect of disturbing over 50 Teal from the pools as the flock flew off swift and sure to the distant tideline where they joined about 40 Shelduck. What a superb flier is the Teal, no wonder they are the sportsman’s prize.

Teal

The rain closed in and began to drip through the elderberry as across the bay Heysham melted into the mizzle. Yet again I felt distinctly wet and this was for real so I called it a day. But as ever it had been a rewarding hour or two.

It’s That Rain Again

Trickling Through

There was a trickle of migrants at my usual cold corners this morning rather than the hoped for rush of migration to turn them into hot spots. Yet again hat and gloves were essential bits of kit for the first hour or more in the brisk westerly.

With an eye and an ear on the sky I killed time and counted the waders at Knott End, 190 Redshank and 200 Oystercatcher, with 7 Eider waiting at the ferry terminal. Things were so quiet I found time to confirm for Birdtrack breeding House Sparrow, Collared Dove and Starling along the Esplanade where the large old terraced houses provide ledges and cavities galore. Below the Esplanade a couple of Meadow Pipits were not this morning’s migrants, neither were 2 Pied Wagtails or the 3 Twite feeding on the remnants of the seed provided for them. I was just about to move on to my next migration hotspot when 2 Redpoll flew over heading east. One positive, it does seem to be a better spring for Redpoll, and maybe that is because more of them left us during the abnormally cold winter and they are now returning bang on cue, as they used to do? Someone said to me just the other day that plainer birds often make for better photographs: I suppose that the closely related Twite and Redpoll might be described as “little brown jobs” without many distinguishing features?

Lesser Redpoll
Twite
Fluke Hall and Ridge Farm were similarly quiet, with grounded Meadow Pipits numbering 18 and resident singing Skylarks 6. A spring flock of Linnets along the gorse numbered about 45, with 3 local Stock Dove feeding quietly in the stubble field whilst 2 Wheatear below the sea wall were probably new in. Another group of Linnets numbering 6 were alongside Fluke Hall Lane, as was a singing Chiffchaff with briefly, a perched up Merlin that as I approached, flew over Wheel Lane.

There was a little more spring activity during my Lane Ends to Pilling Water walk where I found 2 Chiffchaff, one singing and one silent and a lone singing Willow Warbler in the plantation, a Reed Bunting, 2 Wheatear, and then on the water noted the Little Grebe pair with eggs. Again, I noted the quiet staccato of overflying Redpoll, putting down one in my notebook.

All was mainly quiet at Pilling Water save for a Stoat that scurried around the stones, boulders, pipes and maintenance equipment left there by the Environment Agency. I think the Stoat makes a living by preying on the rabbits that make a home in and under the same leftovers, but it moved so fast I had no chance of taking a photo today, the one below taken earlier in the winter, when it was properly cold.

Stoat
The few birds around were 3 Sand Martin and a single Swallow over the wildfowler’s pools that seemed to disappear as quickly as they arrived, 2 Little Egrets and a few more Meadow Pipits and Skylarks.

Swallow
Things look better for the next three days with a building high pressure and the promise of a few ringing sessions on the horizon.

Warm Weather?

Ice Drive

The idea was to put out some bird food at Rawcliffe Moss and then have a wander round birding. The drive down to the track was both interesting and educational as I negotiated the narrow sheet of ice at about 10mph, luckily without meeting any vehicles coming in the opposite direction. I don’t think I will be taking up Scandinavian ice driving though.



After a week of snow and ice the Tree Sparrows are still around, if in much reduced numbers, and I counted 110 this morning with the usual 12-15 Chaffinch, 2 Dunnock, 9 Starling, 3 Yellowhammer, but only 3 Blackbirds, a couple of Jackdaws and several Wood Pigeon. I dumped another bucket of seed. That should keep them going for a few days but not if more snow covers it.

Blackbird

Looking west I could see six Roe Deer in the stubble of the next farm over but they quickly disappeared over the brow and out of sight before I could raise the camera. I decided that not only was I visible against the expanse of snow and ice behind me, I was also making a lot of noise by crunching over the packed icy roadside in an effort to avoid the slippery vehicle tracks. I persevered a bit longer by where possible sticking to the virgin snow enough to disturb 6 Grey Partridge from under a hedgerow and a mixed party of Chaffinch with several Blue Tit and Great Tit, but it was noisy, slow progress from me.

I walked through the wood where at least I wouldn’t be as visible or clatter over the ice, just the winter brash of fallen branches. In there more than 30 Woodpigeon exploded from the tree tops with a few extra Blackbirds and a single Song Thrush rummaging through the litter.

Rather than spend more time trudging through the deep and crisp and even to no avail, I decided to return the bucket to the barn and maybe use a little time with camera at the ready to see what turned up. Up there the Dunnocks and Robins quarrelled amongst themselves over possession of the best bits of the farm bric-a-brac, the jumbled mess of old discarded machinery, the rattling plastic and muddy chaos of daily ins and outs, whilst a couple of tail in the air Wrens rattled around the nooks and crannies of discarded timber.

Robin

Dunnock

It was the alarm calls that alerted me that a Stoat Mustela erminea was also mooching through the long left bits and pieces, but the birds were watching it and so was I.

Stoat

Stoat

Apparently Stoats mate once a year and the female is pregnant for 11 months, which is a long time for such a small mammal, and while they have several youngsters which are called kits, the males do not help in raising them.

I hadn’t seen a Grey Wagtail for a week or two but without warning one reappeared in the usual spot.

Grey Wagtail

Grey Wagtail

And another late lunch.