The Safari was joined by the main man LCV last week for our 'boys' long weekend to the East coast. As he was driving up to us from the Midlands we arranged to meet at the RSPB Hesketh Out Marsh reserve where local birder SD had recently come across a couple of American Wigeons and a nice selection of other waterfowl and waders including a distant Little Stint.
There weren't many Wigeon on the first pool west of the car park but scanning through them one female stood out as 'odd'. Much paler, almost sandy, than the others around it and with no hint of red tones on its head which was rather 'salt n peppery' with that obvious dark eye smudge. It looked a good candidate for a female American Wigeon but was it? We took some pics but they weren't up to much in the dull, windy conditions and the bird quite distant.
LCV had a twitter conversation with SD and he agreed it was the bird he'd seen and thought was probably a female American Wigeon although he'd not been able to see the pure white underwings nor had any confirmation that anyone else had either.
Suddenly a huge roar when up and a jet from the base across the river came arcing overhead.
It sent up an immense flock of ducks from further down the reserve, most of which were Wigeon. They went past us and settled down at the far west end of the reserve so off we went to try our luck at finding the drake American Wigeon.
Most of the Wigeon had gone down in the long grass and were out of sight so we had to make do with a gawp at the still fairly exotic site of Great White Egrets, of which there were three, and numerous Little Egrets which weren't counted but well over 10 were present.
It's almost an odd day on the coastal marshes if you see a Heron before a Little Egret now. There was just one Heron present and for a brief moment we had all three species in the frame together but failed to press the shutter before the Heron had a go at the Great White and ruined the scene. LCV caught the moment but wasn't able to get the Little Egret in frame too.
Try as we might we couldn't find the drake American Wigeon among the throng of Wigeon that were popping their heads up from the long grass to check there were no predators about. Time to move on and head back to Base Camp to make preparations for the long drive early in the morning.
We contacted our American friends in the Challenge showing the pics of the female and they reckon it looks good for one so we've added it (167) on the presumtion it arrived with the drake and will eventually be proven to be the real thing. It does look very very like females photographed by some of our American friends for their Challenge.
And so we set off an hour later than hoped...someone who shall be nameless overslept, but it didn't really matter as our drive across the country was a wet and windy (from the wrong direction) one with the thick cloud making dawn a bit later than it should have been.
First stop was the little hide at Kilnsea Wetlands. No point taking the camera out as although morning had properly broken it was still quite dark and wet. To see through the hide windows they had to be opened but that meant the wind blew the rain in, it was like someone was stood outside throwing buckets of water in at us!
We gave it about an hour before driving down to the Warren and bunking in to the seawatching hide, where we were lucky to get a seat as it was busy in there, lots of folk sheltering from the rain even though the sea wasn't that busy. Small parties of Wigeon and Teal were passing southwards while small flocks of Common Scoters, a dribble of Gannets and distant auks went mostly northwards. A distant Sooty Shearwater was by far the best bird followed by a close in Arctic Skua and a distant Manx Shearwater. A Snipe, a handful of Meadow Pipits and a couple of Skylarks came in off the sea. When we win the lottery we're going to buy SE a much bigger hide to live in and maybe a heater too.
The rain seemed to be easing a bit and news was filtering through of migrant thrushes, mostly Redwings but a few Fieldfares and occasional Ring Ouzels too so we gave up seawatching and headed in to the open and the wet. News then broke of a probable Black Throated Thrush with a flock of Redwings but like most of the other birds they kept moving rather than stopping for a rest and feed, it was only seen by a couple of watchers and remains a 'missed'. Looking around the church, Kew and Cliff Farm it was obvious there weren't many grounded migrants about despite the grotty weather, just a few Redwings, Blackbirds and the odd Brambling or two, a Ring Ouzel was reported feeding on windfall Apples at Cliff Farm but didn't stick around for us.
We broke the 'unwritten rule' and had a cuppa in the new visitor centre - who decided that was a good place for it?????????? The brew was warm and welcome, good value at just a quid and served by very friendly staff who may or may not be aware of the controversies surrounding their workplace. There were briefly a couple of Bramblings at the feeders below the panoramic window which we failed to get a proper look at. Unfortunately the view of the feeders and the panorama of the lighthouse and Spurn Point will be obscured in a few years time as the bank below the window has been planted with Blackthorn which although will be great habitat to replace what has been lost will totally obscure the view without constant management this defeating its object as replacement habitat - duhhhh...who makes these decisions???????
Just outside the VC is the Canal Scrape so we had to have a look and as ever there was a Jack Snipe, just sometimes they are out in plain view - very unusual for them - but today was the usual fairly distant and obscured views, still better than most places you'll see them though.
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| PYLC 168 |
True to form it was doing that up and down 'sewing machine' action all the time it was feeding -we affectionately named him/her Bob the Bobber. A bit of video with some Boom Boom Boom rave music added could have been fun if anyone had the inclination.
Not much else was seen from the hide just small numbers of Skylarks and Redwings passing over, the latter occasionally alighting briefly in the bushes on the far side of the pool.
Time to try somewhere else and as the tide was on the up we decided to head back to the wetland. Quite a few Redshank had come in off the estuary and there was a bit of a gull roost building up where we found a nice selection of Mediterranean Gulls, seven adults, two 2nd winters and a 1st winter, all mostly tucked up half hidden behind a low bank. Other waders included a smattering of Dunlin, a Greenshank and four Black Tailed Godwits but no sign of the Little Stint and Curlew Sandpiper that had been reported regularly over the previous few days. No sign of the Hen Harrier either that had also been present for a few days but we later learned that someone had seen it sometime during the day. With not a lot of excitement and daylight beginning to fade we moved round to Sammy's Point to see if there were any Short Eared Owls quartering the paddocks.
The horse paddocks were devoid of birds but we did have a couple of Whimbrels and a Curlew on the sea defence rocks waiting for the tide to drop. Wandering down to the scrubby area it was evident it was fairly quiet but another birder staking out a clump of bushes told us he'd heard a Ring Ouzel cchacking away in there and indeed as he was speaking it did it again. We had a good look with him from all angles but couldn't see it in the dense vegetation. We left him to it and wandered back along the top bank. With a bit of Redwing activity and a few quick flits noted we went in to the north end of the scrub where we got the fright of our lives when we nearly trod on a snoozing Roe Deer which took a couple of startled steps before leaping the pretty wide ditch on the landward side pf the scrub. We'd hazard a guess no one had been that way for a while. We also inadvertently disturbed a dozen or more Redwings from the scratty hedge on the far side of the ditch, they took off northwards and then some way behind them and not from the bushes came another, it looked a little smaller and getting our bins on it saw it wasn't a Redwing, no red wing no eye-stripe but was plain and streaky, if it had called Richard's Pipit would now be in our notebook we guess.
Our birder friend from earlier had now reappeared some way behind us after working his way throughthe scrub and was beckoning us over. He'd found a Yellow Browed Warbler, which we thoughht was a pretty good find considering the absolute dearth of Goldcrests and easterly winds. It had gone into cover but just a couple of minutes later worked its way out to the front of the bush again.
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| Chuffed that Spurn Bird Obs used this pic on their report for the day |
Cracking little birds absolute beauties, but the lack of easterlies meant that these tiny waifs have flown at least 300 miles across the North Sea against the wind - how do they do that and how far west are they now breeding - western half of European Russia or even Fennoscandinavia??? Really good to get one for our Challenge at #169.
We missed a quickly disappearing Short Eared Owl that perched on a post in the rough paddock then flew up river.
With that news it was now time for tea so off we went up country a few miles to our digs.
Sunday dawned calm and clear, LCV's motor even had a load of frost to scrape off the windscreen before we could depart. With the clear skies and lack of wind we were hopeful that there may be some freshly dropped migrants around although it was also a worry that it was too clear and still and they may just go over at some height and not be seen. But this is Spurn so you never know quite what's going to happen...
We parked up by the church and walked the lane to the Bluebell, no all closed down. Nothing much happening, The churchyard was quiet too so we had a look up the village, not a lot at all and not much overhead either, there were rumours of Ring Ouzel in one of the gardens. We waited around but it didn't show although we got a few glimpses of another Yellow Browed Warbler, one of a record breaking 39 for the day here, and were able to point the camera at one of the local House Sparrows. It comes to something when House Sparrows are the best birds to aim the lens at in this part of the world
A wander down the canal gave us a lot more Reed Buntings than we'd seen on Saturday but were they new in or just not hunkered down against the weather today?
A Roe Deer buck broke cover towards the river but from where it came from there was a birder looking at a patch of Sea Buckthorn, we wondered what he might have found.
There was some interest in the bush in the form of a few Reed Buntings, a Song Thrush and a flock of Starlings. Looking in to the light wasn't good but one of the Starlings didn't look right. We got LCV and his scope on to it and Bingo - best bird of the day/weekend was there, a juvenile Rose Coloured Starling (#170).
We watched it for a few minutes and got a few more birders on to it.
It hung around the bushes often disappearing out of sight for several minutes at a time. Eventually someone came along with a radio and told us no news had broken from the earlier person on the radios or pagers so it looked very much like it was 'our' bird. We moved around a bit to get better light as he put out the news over his radio. From all directions birders could be seen coming our way. This is the first time in about 25 years of visiting here we've found a bird everyone else wanted to see.
We left them to it and went off to see if we could see the elusive showing infrequently Barred Warbler down at the Warren. We had a bit of wait and watched this Kestrel hunting nearby which may be a reason the warbler was keeping its head down.
Our patience was tested to the limit and we gave up to try to get a pic of the Bramblings that were knocking around. We just couldn't get on them at all but we did make our way back to the screen and were lucky that nearly everyone else had wandered off and left plenty of space for us...and for a brief moment the Barred Warbler (#171) came in to view low down in a small Sea Buckthorn bush. Better views were had in the bins and really good to see one of these close up as its a species we very seldom come across.
It did a few circuits, flying across the lane a couple of times and showed well in the top of the 'tall' bushes by the old Observatory building. Great stuff
From there we had another visit to the wetlands to see if the tide had pushed anything in. Plenty of Redshanks and with them was a Spotted Redshank and dodgy Dunlin no one could turn into anything more exciting. Fewer Mediterranean Gulls today but one of the 1st winters was out in the open having a bath but as soon as we raised the camera it took flight.
We had a look at Beacon Ponds where there were quite a number of Grey Plovers roosting along with a couple of Bar Tailed Godwits. A Brent Goose was there too, there weren't many of them around for us this visit. Still no sign of the Hen Harrier or any Short Eared Owls though. We did think we may have found an owl when we saw a Black Headed Gull dive bombing something flying low in the grass, 'just' a Kestrel in the end.
It was amazing how often folk mentioned the mobile Great White Egret over the weekend and it caused a bit of stir when it flopped over the sea defences at the end of the pond and began catching very small fish - we've got used to seeing them all over the place over on our coast, but to many folk they're still out of the ordinary.
Walking back to the car we passed a field margin where a wild bird crop was being enjoyed by some Reed Buntings and Tree Sparrows and looking closely we found a couple of Bramblings and finally got our pic in the gathering gloom (#173).
A quick look over at Sammy's Point gave us a circling Ring Ouzel that didn't drop in the end but turned back towards the coast. Still no Short Eared Owls for us again.
We said earlier we'd found the best bird of the weekend - well it wasn't quite true as once we were back at our digs news broke that someone had found and photographed a Red Flanked Bluetail but hadn't told anyone until they'd got home and identified their photo in the evening.
Monday morning saw us seawatching again. Once again there wasn't much happening and the hide cleared out and the relief palpable when news broke that the Red Flanked Bluetail had been refound. Sadly it was refound an hours walk across the breach and an hour back which we didn't have time for so we weren't able to go to see it.
We did have a quick look at the Canal Scrape where there the Jack Snipe was almost invisible but a Dunlin made up for it by being very showy.
A great trip, 99 species seen, an embarrassing gap on our Life List filled, four year birds and photos for our Challenge tally.
LCV had another full day with us before he had to go home so we had an afternoon dog walk up country to see if we could find him a Dipper and us a Grey Wagtail for our Challenges. It wasn't long before the River Brock gave up its secrets, a Grey Wagtail (#174) for us and an unphotographable Dipper for him.
Across on the hills where Buzzards aren't welcome Heather burning was being carried out to provide new growth for the Red Grouse - looks a bit close to the woodland for our liking, will have to go back and see if the trees have been damaged. It wouldn't surprise us as trees can provide cover for predators of Red Gouse, their chicks and eggs so aren't really tolerated. The grouse moors are devoid of wildlife except that which doesn't affect the grouse in any way and can tolerate the regular burning, which means very little!
Nipping upstream to another site along the river gave us much better views of a Dipper, it even gave a bit of song for us.
Finally LCV's last morning with us saw us back at Hesketh Out Marsh to see if we could find the American Wigeons - no joy, the high tides over the weekend had pushed most of the birds off the marsh and filled the pools with water so there was little mud for the wading birds so it was a bit of a disappointing visit really - well it just means we'll have to go again before too long.
A great weekend and mega thanks to LCV for his company and all the driving, we'll deffo be doing it all again next October.
Where to next? We hope to get out on Safari somewhere towards the end of next week.
In the meantime let us know who's been migrating through your outback.
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