Titchwell

In a desperate attempt to reclaim some free time after a long week of family stuff I headed up the A11 today for a morning birding Titchwell and Stiffkey.

I arrived at Titchwell around 7am and had a probable Pied Flycatcher in the trees along the entrance track but couldn't get it in the bins and gave up waiting for better views before I'd seen it well enough to be sure.

At Island hide I was surprised to find the White-rumped Sandpiper just outside the hide feeding with a flock of Dunlin and a Juvenile Curlew Sandpiper. Of course at Twitchwell the sun is in your face in the mornings looking east but I grabbed a few shots fighting the harsh light as well as I could.

A juvenile Little-ringed Plover dropped in and there were several Ruff, Lapwing, Common Sandpipers and Avocet feeding close in. Blackwits were further out and others reported a Greenshank. I picked out a couple of Great Egrets and a Snipe before Bearded Tit and Water Rail put in an appearance. Two Spoonbill flew over towards Thornham before I moved on down to the beach.

Curlew Sandpiper

White-rumped Sandpiper

White-rumped Sandpiper

White-rumped Sandpiper

Ruff

White-rumped Sandpiper

Dunlin (White-rumped piper behind)

At the beach I scanned the sea but it was a little disappointing with a few Gannets and Terns but little else of note. On the wader front there were lots of Oystercatchers a few small flocks of Turnstone, Sanderling and Ringed Plover. Whimbrel, Curlew and Barwit made up the best of the rest. Walking back I picked up a Hobby flying over the marsh and another two Great Egrets. A Marsh Harrier flushed the gulls as I headed back to the car park. I checked all the car park areas for migrants but it was quiet bird wise.

I moved down to Stiffkey wood and gave that and good slog before heading home with a days count of 88 but just the one year tick moving my year list to 231 and just two away from my worst ever total.

Another IOC update and another two ticks lost

So the IOC have released update 14.2 and within it lies bad news for British listers. All Redpolls have been listed as one taxa so having preciously lost the split of Arctic Redpoll which was considered two species, Couse's Arctic Redpoll (Acanthis hornemanni exilipes) and Hornemann's Arctic Redpoll (Acanthis hornemanni) and then was lumped into one species of Arctic Redpoll following a new study led by The university of Colerado - Boulder the IOC have now lumped both Arctic Redpoll and indeed the Common or Mealy Redpoll (Acanthis Flammea) into one single group of all Redpolls namely (Acanthis Caberet) 

The IOC update states that they will now treat all Redpoll taxa as one conspecific with the English name Redpoll. "following Chesser et al 2024 based on genomic homogeneity phenotypic variation, overlapping habitat, and lack of evidence of prolonged isolation (Mason and Taylor 2015 Funk et al 2021"

This basically means that despite the birds appearing different enough for birders to pick them out and identify the various types there isn't enough of a genetic difference to establish more than one species that overlaps habitat and shows differing plumage depending on that habitat or at least that's my take on the update. 

So having seen and listed all four species of Redpoll in the UK (when they were four species) I now find my list has gone backwards from 449 to 447 and I've now seen just one species of Redpoll in the UK.

That's the way the cookie crumbles and going forward a Redpoll is a Redpoll is Redpoll is a Redpoll.

Quick walk round Wanstead

Needing to clear my head I decided on a walk around Wanstead in search of migrants, I put two hours parking on the car and set off finding four Wheatear in the second roped off area and one in the first. A walk around long wood turned up a couple of Spotted Flycatchers and a few Willow Warblers in amongst the Chiffchaffs and Long-tailed Tits. Great Spotted Woodpecker and Kestrel were the only other birds of note although both Blackcap and Whitethroat were vocal.

Morning at Dungeness with Jim

I woke early today and set off for Dungeness with Jim arriving at the sea watch hide about 6.45am. None of the locals had thought the weather good enough to produce much so hadn't turned up but it was the only day I had free for the visit so we set up and tried to milk the seawatch for what we could. Lot's of Gannet and Sandwich Tern were constants and a couple of Porpoise entertained us for a while. A couple of young Kittiwakes flew west before we picked out a very distant Arctic Skua for our first year tick of the trip. (Others reported Bonxie and later a Goshawk which is a most unexpected bird for the point although the birder that reported it seemed to know the species well. A flock of White Storks circled overhead whilst we were back in the car so we missed them.)

Next we scanned the patch gulls and found a single juvenile Yellow-legged Gull among the throng which contained mostly Herring and Black-headed gulls with the odd Lesser Black-backed.. A Raven sat on the top of the power station at one end and a Peregrine at the other. A male Sparrowhawk flew through the power station and must have caught something as it spent quite some time out of sight on the floor behind the fence line. Two Wheatear and a Whinchat were spotted on the wall along with several Meadow Pipits before a large flock of Sand Martins numbering over 100 flew in and over the power station. 

Scotney Sandpits

At Boulderwell we found five Cattle Egrets before making our way down the road to Scotney to park opposite Jury's Gap and the walk out to the sandpit area which we'd surprisingly never visited before. The Pectoral Sandpiper was our target here but proved very hard to find and took almost two hours before we had great scope views following a Marsh Harrier flushing everything. Jim found an adult Little Stint for my third year tick of the day. Two Wood Sandpipers, nine Green Sandpipers and three Common Sandpipers added to the list along with twenty or more Ringed Plover, two Ruff, five Dunlin, Two Greenshank, a Redshank several Avocet and Blackwits. A Peregrine landed to bath in the puddles and dry out on the sandy bank and both Sparrowhawk and Hobby came through too to make for a very enjoyable session before the rain came and had us running for the car.

Back at Hanson hide overlooking ARC pit we found a single Glossy Ibis and Great Egret before picking out a juvenile Black Tern along with several adult and juvenile Common Terns. At least seven Garganey were found among the other ducks present which included Teal, Pochard, Shoveler, Tufted, Gadwall and Mallard. Waders were represented by Ringed Plovers, a juvenile Little ringed Plover, Oystercatchers, a Common Sandpiper and Lapwing.

Cattle Egrets

Garganey

Glossy Ibis

A lovely morning seeing some great birds and enjoying the company of like minded fools too. Species count for the day was 93.

The pointless year list has now reached 230 and only four short of my worst ever so there's hope yet for 2024.

Hudsonian Godwit at Burton mere wetlands

I missed the Hudwit at Meare heath back in 2015 so it's been a long time waiting for another chance to see this species so when one was found at Burton mere wetlands on 12th August I thought the opportunity might come to connect with it but it was only seen for a few hours on 13th and then not since until yesterday when it reappeared at Burton mere wetlands and showed well all afternoon into the early evening. I called Jim and we decided we'd go give it a try today and set off at 6am to make the 210 mile trip. By 8am news came through that the bird had returned and so arriving just before 10am we started the 0.9 mile walk out to border hide where the bird was reportedly still showing. The hide was packed but we found some space and settled down to watch the bird as it slept hidden among the flock of around 150 Black-tailed Godwits. I found a single Barwit and several Knot in the roost and watched for thirty minute or so to see first a couple of wing flaps to show the dark underwing and then even on a couple of occasions saw the birds head. The volunteers were understandably putting some passive pressure on the group to clear the hide once they'd seen the bird to allow room for those outside so I grabbed a few record shots and moved on as requested.

Border hide

The dark underwing

Sleeping

Still sleeping

The head shot

Another head shot

and sleeping again

Also seen on the visit were 13 Greenshank, 20+ Snipe, 20+ Ruff, Great Egret, Marsh Harrier, Lapwings etc. A smart reserve well marshalled by the volunteers on the day. The bird flew off an hour after we left the hide and didn't return so we really timed the visit well today. A horrible run home with the M25 playing up and adding an hour to our return journey as it often does.

year list now 227 Life list 449

The Hudsonian Godwit has five previous accepted records 

1981 Blacktoft sands East Yorks/Countess weir Devon (presumed same bird)

1983 Blacktoft sands presumed returning bird

1988 Slains pools, Aberdeen

2015 Meare Heath, Somerset

2020 Eden estuary, Fife

There's also the 2023 record from Shetland likely to be accepted which would make the Burton mere bird the 7th for Britain.

Canvasback back at Abberton

The Canvasback that wintered at Abberton in Essex from 11th November 2023 until 7th January 2024  returned to the reservoir on 11th August. I managed a distant scope view of it last year but failed to see it this year before it left on 7th January despite having a go.

The bird has returned with a small flock of Pochard and with the water level high on the main reservoir it has chosen to reside in the centre body of water between the causeways. On arrival we located the bird very easily lucky that JP and ST put us on the general area the bird had last been seen. The bird was constantly diving to feed and remained quite distant but after a couple of hours it motored through the water towards the causeway below us and climbed out onto the bank to preen revealing it's heavy molt. It gave fantastic views for the next hour or so before we left with it now sleeping on the bank.

On this visit we also noted three Spoonbill, a fly over Cattle Egret and another on a nest, at least eleven Great Egrets, Green Sandpiper, two Common Sandpipers, a juvenile Little ringed Plover, several juvenile Common Terns, a Red Kite, a very early Wigeon amongst the mixed flock of Shoveler, Tufted and Pochard.

year list now 226 and just nine required to beat my worst year ever.

juvenile Little ringed Plover

juvenile Common Tern

juvenile Common Tern

juvenile Common Tern

juvenile Little ringed Plover

A lovely few hours watching the reservoir, chatting and grabbing the above images.

Tart ticks missed so far this year...Dipper, Puffin, Pied Flycatcher, Red Grouse, FIRECREST!, any shearwaters, SNOW BUNTING, Black Guillemot, Ring-necked Duck and Hooded Crow (these my top ten target species this year according to Bubo) I've not see a Skua yet this year or a Chough with limited time on the coast. Little Stint is way down the list but one I do expect to see this autumn so a few targets if I'm to challenge that low total of 234 (my lowest ever since I started year listing)

Semi palmated Sandpiper at Ferry Pool Pagham LNR

I've just enjoyed a week at Butlins in Bognor with two of my three grandchildren so took the opportunity to visit Pagham LNR on route to the venue being just nine miles away. I stopped at the car park of Pagham LNR and walked down the path to Ferry hide which overlooks Ferry pool. The Semi-palmated Sandpiper was out on the pool keeping close company with a single Curlew Sandpiper making it easy to pick out. There were a few Lapwing, Blackwits and Avocet on the scrape with them and the far back edge of the pool had a single Green and Common Sandpiper. This is only the third Semi-palmated Sandpiper I've seen following the one at East Tilbury in 2011 and Titchwell in 2019.

Semi-palmated Sandpiper with Curlew Sandpiper

The waders of Ferry pool 

Semi P (Centre)

Ferry pool Pagham LNR

I drove down to Church Norton were I found what appeared to be a Pied Flycatcher high in the trees behind the churchyard but after the initial sighting I failed to pick it up again despite a good search. Once out on the sand I set about scanning the waders. Over fifty Ringed Plover were present with a couple of Dunlin among them. Four Greenshank were very distant and lot's of Whimbrel and Curlew fed along the mud banks. A single Redshank and several Ostercatcher were also noted before a single Wheatear was seen on the concrete bank and a couple of Sandwich Terns came and went whilst I was there.  The only other birds present were Little Egret, Grey Heron and a few Black-headed Gull.

Year list now 225 

The week with the grandkids was a joy of course, swimming, shows, rides, swimming shows rides repeat! I know I'm so lucky to have this time with them and I don't take a moment of it for granted.

I've stayed at many holiday camps over the years and although they aren't my holiday venue of choice these days it has to be said that Butlins remains the flag bearer for them all. Clean, well managed , lot's of staff that are all geared to looking after the visitors and my grandkids had a blast from the first to the last minute.

Temminck's Stint at Blue house farm Essex

I had a free afternoon today so asked the Jims if they wanted me to run them up to Blue house farm as they still wanted to see the Temminck's Stint and still needed Wood and Curlew Sandpiper for year ticks. They both fancied the trip so we set off early afternoon and after finding a place in the packed small car park we made our way out to the hide straight away which we found quite full but managed to squeeze in.

On arrival the Temminck's was showing well on a small shingle island in front of the hide so I took advantage and grabbed a few more images before scanning the marsh to see what else we could find.

Three Curlew Sandpipers gave me a bonus year tick before finding three Wood Sandpipers for the Jims to add their third tick of the day. Two Greenshank, four Common Sandpipers, eight Green Sandpipers, two Ruff and nine Spoonbill added to the day list. A number of Avocet and hundreds of Black-tailed Godwit were still present and a count of sixteen Snipe in flight was nice too. As the tide pushed a few more birds in we noted six Ringed Plover and several Dunlin. Both Marsh Harrier and Kestrel hunted over the marsh and Yellow Wagtail numbers were lower than the weekend with just a couple seen although people reported more from the other hide.

Temminck's Stint

Blue house farm is a low key reserve but has benefitted from the wet weather this year with some impressive bird numbers using the flood. Breeders this year include Pochard, Tufted Duck, Shoveler, Shelduck, Mallard, Gadwall and even Teal have raised a brood here. I wish it was just that bit closer to home so I could visit more often within the time restrictions I currently have.

Greenshank

Greenshank

Pochard

Little Grebe

Temminck's Stint

Temminck's Stint

Temminck's Stint

Temminck's Stint

Temminck's Stint

Temminck's Stint

The Stint appears to be a juvenile born in the high arctic this year and on it's way down to winter in tropical Africa. An interesting fact I've learnt over the years about Temminck's Stint is that both male and female brood separate clutches with the male brooding the first clutch whilst the female goes on to brood the second which mitigates brood loss to predation.

The pointless year list moved up to 224 as I chase down last years record low of 234 

the top ten targets according to Bubo : 

Dipper

Puffin

Pied Flycatcher

Red Grouse

Firecrest

Manx Shearwater

Snow Bunting

Black Guillemot

Ring necked Duck

Black Grouse

this list according to the birds most other listers have seen that I haven't so far this year.

My target list would be a little different and would include.....Little Stint, Arctic Skua and Great Skua.