Mystery bird - everyday is a schoolday

Everyday is a schoolday, well today was certainly a schoolday for me. 

Picture the scene...

I arrive early at Druridge, the sun has just come up over the sea, so it's not over the dunes yet and it's gloomy still. I step out of the car and hear a bird singing from the bushes - I think I recognise it, but I'm not sure and certainly can't put a species to it. I go and investigate,  I can't record it because the voice recorder app on my phone hasn't updated or something - typical.  the song was almost Sylvia warbler like, but 'jangly' and metallic like a corn bunting. The bird is still deep in cover. 

Something flies out of the willow and lands close by,  I fire off a few shots but it's not properly light - ISO 3200 so not great. I'm still stumped. Looks like a dumpy warbler with thick pink legs, Cetti's have thick pink legs...but it wan't right for Cetti's. I was still stumped, so I sent a very poor BoC shot to a couple of people. It never showed again and stopped singing a soon as the sun came out. I continued on.

I downloaded the photos this evening and lightened them up a bit. Not a Cetti's - that's for sure. Was it a Locustella warbler? It looked un-streaked and the pink legs and song threw me off the trail. Was it a warbler at all, could it be a Sprosser? Some of it looked right for Sprosser, some didn't. I sent the photos to Mike Carr and Neil Osbourne to see if they could help. 

Mystery Bird

A different angle

We chewed over the possibility of Sprosser but something didn't look right but what was it? Neil went back to Locustella, on closer examination of the photo, some of the coverts appear to have dark centers and Grasshopper Warblers can have pink rather than orange-pink legs. Did the gloom just make it look dark and what about that song?

Neil eventually nailed it with a song from Xeno Canto - which is exactly what I heard - a sub-song of a juvenile Grasshopper Warbler, I've never heard this before. Here is a link to the song https://www.xeno-canto.org/579804 - it's worth a listen.

As they say, you live and learn, especially in birding. Big thanks to Mike and Neil for their help.

There were a lot of Chiffchaffs this morning on the sunny edge of the bushes, I counted at least 12 between the path and the Dunbar Burn. There was also Reed Warbler, Whitethroat and Blackcap and two Spotted Flycatchers

One the many Chiffchaffs

And another looking at a fly

Reed Warbler

One of two Spotted Flycatchers

There was less viz-mig than previous mornings but the Meadow Pipit passage increased as the morning went on (I left at 08.30 with a count of 58) and a single Tree Pipit went over. Hardly any hirrundines though and most of the Swallows were local birds. 

There were a lot of birds around the new-ish ditch by the Dunbar Burn, using the fence as a perch. Meadow Pipits were stopping to drink and bathe and they were joined by a single juvenile Whinchat, Linnets, Goldfinches, Skylark, Reed Buntings and Stonechats. Worth watching this ditch I reckon, it could get a Bluethroat.

This Robin was enjoying the early sunshine - I've read that they do this rid themselves of parasites. 

Robin - enjoying the sun

Full list here

More photos...

Small White

Speckled Wood

Kestrel over

Way west

There's been no updates for while because I've been west, way west, in fact at one point as far west as you can get in mainland Britain - Ardnamurchan Point. We were staying on the Morvern Peninsula for a week but traveled around Sunart, Adrnamurchan and over to Mull a couple of times. It's a beautiful area but it is a lot wetter than here in the east and we got wet a few times.

Doirlinn

Heading for Sanna Bay

It was nice to get back to Druridge and stand on the dune and have the north on my left where it belongs. I've been down to the patch everyday since I back. 

Janet and I had brief wander on Saturday after our long drive south. Offshore the Scoter flock numbered 400-450 and there were six Red-throated Divers with them. This ship - the Normand Clipper has taken up residence in the Bay, seemingly it is to do with the new connector cable to Norway. 

The Normand Clipper

On Sunday afternoon,  it was quite warm with sunny spells, Chris Barlow let me know he'd seen a new hover for the patch so I went looking. I didn't see it but saw some other species and a couple of interesting other beasties. 45 plus Goldfinch rattled around me whilst I was hunkered down with the macro lens and a whimbrel flew south. 

Hoverfly Eristalis intricaria (worn female)

Female Helophilus pendulus

Eupeodes latifasciatis (f)

I think this might be one of the Lauxaniid Marsh Flies?

22-Spot Ladybird

When the sun went, I had a look offshore and three Sooty Shearwaters went north and the Red-throated Diver count was up to ten. 

On Monday evening Janet and I had a walk through up to the north of the patch and back by the beach. Our first bird was colossal female Sparrowhawk coming off the dunes. Further north we had Buzzards and a juvenile Marsh Harrier. 

This morning, my pre-work wander didn't get me far as there was some good vizmig going on. First birds heard were a small flock of Siskin going south. As I walked along the road, good number of Meadow Pipits, Sand Martins and House Martins flew south. A single Tree Pipit went south, calling and by the Dunbar burn there were two Wheatears and a juvenile Whinchat with a gang of resting Meadow Pipits and Linnets. 

A few Herring Gull loafed just offshore and this second winter bird gave good views in nice light and I found what I think is a dead Manx Shearwater on the beach. 

Second-winter Herring Gull

Dead Manx Shearwater

I estimated the following counts in my 45 minutes or so of counting

75 Sand Martin

57 House Martin

86 Meadow Pipits

32 Siskin (in three groups)

17 Swallow

1 Tree Pipit

This evening, I had a quick look on the sea, there wasn't much to report but this Chinook Helicopter gave good views as it passed low over the dunes. 

Chinook

Sanderlings on the beach this evening - adult and juvenile

Vizmig and the two bird theory

I've tried a bit of viz-migging this week, but probably missed the vizmig highlight of the year today - a huge southerly movement of swifts, with thousands of birds logged at east coast hot-spots including 28,0000 at Hummanby Gap. I hadn't anticipated it so didn't get down to the patch until lunchtime, by the time I did there were still lots of swift headed south but nothing like the numbers reported earlier.

After reports of crossbill movements, I positioned myself on the big dune at 5.30am on Wednesday morning. When I arrived on site, there were 11 siskins feeding on the alders before moving north. I estimated about another 100+ siskins, all moving south in small groups of 15-25 until 7.30am. Nothing like the 6500 Tom Tams had at Tynemouth and no crossbills - my target for the morning.

I tried for crossbills on another two mornings but no joy.The meadow pipits kept me entertained though and fly-through little egrets on two mornings were welcome sightings of scarce bird this year. The big dune is a good place to scan the budge fields and I picked up both wood and green sandpipers from there.

Meadow pipit song-flighting from the big dune

In the bay, the common scoter flock reached a peak of about 1400 birds midweek. On Friday, I abandoned viz-mig and had walk north and south. A family group of pied wags entertained me at the Dunbar burn and a new moth...

New moth - Pammene aurana (there were at least eight of them)

One of the pied wag youths

New hoverfly for the patch Cheilosia illustrata - one of the bumblebee mimics (iPhone photo)

As is typical, the weather deteriorated just in time for the weekend. I manged a wander between showers on Saturday morning and it was nice to catch up with Bob Biggs and ADMc. Waders from the Budge included  four, maybe five ruff including gingery, black and white/cream coloured birds, 19 black-tailed godwits (most or all Greenland race birds), two knot, two ringed plover and two dunlin. A female marsh harrier was my first since lockdown and an adult cuckoo shot through the dunes - northbound.

Today, Janet and I had a walk to the hides, mostly looking for hoverflies but we found the four spoonbills, that have commuted between Cresswell Pond and the Budge fields, feeding on the doughnut pool from the little hide.

Four spoonbills- an they were all awake!

mating common blue damselflies

This evening, news came through of a female pied flycatcher near the Budge screen. Pied Fly is a scarce bird in any year at Druridge, unheard of in June, so worth a look before the footy I thought.

Graham Sorrie reported north of the path to the screen-hide. The first bird I got my bins on was a spotted flycatcher.

Spotted Flycatcher

I knew Graham wouldn't have mistaken spotted fly for pied, but for two flycatchers of any species to be at Druridge in June would be mega rare, but I couldn't rule out the two-bird theory and I was right not to as shortly after that a female pied flycatcher appeared on the same edge. My first pied fly since 2014!

Pied flycatcher

I'm not sure what is going on here. Is this early returning birds or very late northerly migrants? Someone on Twitter sent me a link to a wind map and a report of high temperatures and forest fires in Arctic Siberia - which is worrying in itself but might explain these birds?

Arriving, departing or just passing through

I like this time of year - birds are on the move. I am fascinated by migration and at this time of year we have birds arriving, freshly returned from their wintering areas in Europe or Africa. We have birds that have spent the winter here in Northumberland moving on to breed in continental Europe or high into the Arctic tundra. And we have birds passing through our patch, on their way from wintering grounds to breeding areas - just stopping on their way or flying overhead.

This weekend has seen the arrival of a few summer visitors onto the patch - chiffchaffs are singing, a stunning male yellow wagtail was in the dunes (my earliest Druridge record by four days) - he may of course be just passing through and swallows and sand martins have increased in number. There's a lot more skylarks and meadow pipits around too.

Birds just passing through include wheatears, these early ones will probably be staying in the UK, soon the Greenland race will pass through - headed for much more northerly climes.

Some of the birds leaving us include whooper swans and pink-footed geese - the five remaining whoopers that have been in the front field for the last month or so have gone this afternoon. A skein of 60 pink-foots flew high to the north and about 30 whoopers passed through in the same direction today. Wigeon and teal numbers have decreased rapidly but there are still about 120 curlew in the vicinity of the Pools.

A jack snipe was out in front of the Budge screen this morning, probably its last stopping point before crossing the North Sea as it heads for its breeding grounds. I love jack snipes and this one gave us some great views, watch it bobbing in this video.

Jack Snipe Druridge 100416 from Iain Robson on Vimeo.

There's been a huge influx of black-headed gulls onto the Budge fields this weekend and with them some Mediterranean gulls. For my WeBS count today  I estimated 750 BHGs and there were a minimum of four Meds. Jonathan Farooqi counted a minimum of ten Meds yesterday - easily a patch record.

There'll no doubt be some more arrivals in the next few days, willow warbler is overdue - it will soon be followed by the other warblers from Africa.

Patch year list is 107 species.

Little Auks and Long-tailed Tits

The northerly blow during the middle of last week brought some seabird action. I was at work on the Wednesday, so missed the main action, but I managed a 30 minute seawatch before work on Thursday. Between 0830 and 0905 I counted at least 68 little auks headed north, most quite distant in poor light, but some little flocks came in a  bit closer.

I also saw two great northern divers, one headed not and one south. The other highlight was two small groups of fieldfare coming in-off the sea, 23 in total. I love to see thrushes, or any migrants, coming 'in-off'. Vizmig at its best.

There was evidence of a small fall of birds on Friday afternoon. I only walked a short section of the bushes and counted 40+ blackbirds, a few song thrushes and great-spotted woodpeckers.

By Saturday morning, most of the blackbirds had moved out. There were four black-tailed godwits on the Budge fields and the water rails were very vocal.

In the dunes to the north of the bushes, there were hundreds of finches feeding on thistle, ragwort and burdock seeds, over 350 goldfinches and at least 60 greenfiches with a few chaffinches, linnets and a handful of reed bunting among them.

The only flying thing I managed to photograph all weekend

On Sunday morning we put some nets up to ring some birds, probably for the last time this year. We caught an amazing 75 birds,  25 of them being long-tailed tits, 14 goldfinches, our first two siskins of the year and a great-spotted woodpecker amongst others.

The addition great northern diver puts my patch year-list onto 171, the same as last year and my equal best in eight years. There's still time yet....

170 little auk
171 great northern diver

A couple of ringing sessions and a seawatch

A couple of days of work as given rise to the opportunity to do some ringing at Druridge.

On Sunday the wind was in the west, so I decided to postpone a planned ringing session until Monday, when the wind was forecast to be out of the east. Bad move.....

There were a lot of warblers around the bushes on Sunday, but on a clear night, they all left, leaving the bushes very quiet indeed on Monday morning. We only ringed 15 birds and the only warblers were three blackcaps.

Yesterday,  I tried a bit of viz-migging from the big dune, but there wasn't much of migging going on. Of note were at least eight ruff on the silage fields and 13 black-tailed godwit that lifted off the Budge fields and flew north. House martins and sand martins are few now, but there are still plenty of swallows.

I had a similarly unspectacular seawatch yesterday evening seeing only one Manx shearwater and one Arctic skua of note in an hour.

Today's ringing session was a little more worthwhile, but given the time of year, the bushes were still very quiet, any migrants must have overshot Druridge on a clear and calm night.

James Common (aka Tintin) joined me and we caught 20 new birds. On the warbler front were six blackcaps, one wood warbler (new for the patch), one chiffchaff and one lesser whitethroat.

Lesser whitethroat

Wood Warbler. Very unexpected. Not the best photo - taken with the iPhone.

The swallow chicks have departed the little hide. There are two chicks left in the last nest in the Oddie hide, they should fledge in nine days or so for a later trip down to Africa.

150 spotted redshank
151 wood warbler
152 lesser whitethroat

Patch List 235

PWC Competition - 215

Swift Exit

After a look around the plantation and bushes by the entrance to Druridge, having seen a chiffchaff, great-spotted woodpecker, goldcrests and Ian Douglas of note, I was chatting to Roger Foster when he said 'I've got a swift'

Any swift in October requires a grilling. Unfortunately this bird was already quite distant and was heading north. It did bank around, three or four times, even looking like it might head south once, but it didn't. I saw it briefly in the scope before we lost it as continued north.

We had nothing better than silhouetted views in very poor light against the sky. At times, when it banked, the wing-tips looked sharp and when it banked again they looked blunter. Pallid swift has to be a possibility at this time of year but we couldn't do anything with it at this distance and in this light. Pallid/common swifts can be tricky in Spain with stunning light against the hills.so this one will go int he notebook as 'Swift sp'

I had an hour on the big dune, scanning the skies - nothing.

Seemingly it, or another swift, was seen again mid-afternoon. I don't know who by.

There was a bit of vizmig today, with groups of skylarks going over, a few pied wags and meadow pipits and a flock of redpolls headed south. A steady stream of herring gulls also headed south. A peregrine put up the gulls and lapwings from the fields - my first of the year unbelievably.

I was back on the patch in the afternoon after three snow buntings were reported on the beach by the turning circle. They'd moved south a bit (thanks for the wave Neil) just beyond the blockhouse.

After been absent from Druridge for a few years, I've connected with snow bunting in the last three winters.

Snow Buntings

167 peregrine

168 snow bunting

Ringing Demo

I've said it before and I will no doubt say it again. I've given up with weather forecasts. Look out the window and see what its doing is the best way, especially as we can now see 13 wind turbines from our bedroom window.

The forecast for this morning was 13 mph westerlies, gusting up to 28mph - no good for ringing at Druridge. The reality at 7.30am was virtually flat calm with a light southerly. So we put some nets up.

There was a bio-blitz type event organised by NWT this weekend, so we agreed to do a ringing session as part of it. Quite a few folk turned up to see what we were up to. We caught 23 birds, which wasn't bad considering a lot of the new arrivals had obviously shipped-out in the clear conditions overnight.

Star of the show for the punters was undoubtedly this great spotted woodpecker (not so much fun the poor ringers who had to extract it and hold it for a photo - but to be honest it was quite well-behaved)

Great-spotted woodpecker

Other ringing highlights were whitethroat, blackcap and two chiffchaffs.

It was still good for viz-mig with small groups of goldfinch, tree sparrow, meadow pipit and skylark going through with the occasional pied and grey wags, linnet and lapwing. Pink-footed geese were moving through most of the morning in small groups.

In the bushes one, probably two, yellow-browed warblers were still calling.

What is most worrying is a incident of cattle rustling. The cows, that have been doing such a great job of tackling the rank vegetation on the Budge fields have vanished. As they were doing a grand job, surely NWT wouldn't have taken them off? The only answer is that they have been rustled. The thieves were obviously not being keen on ponies as they left them behind. 

I will report the disappearance to NWT tomorrow and report back.

A tale of 'the one that got away'

There is an interesting pre-amble in the latest issue British Birds to the rare bird report for 2012. The introductory text talks about changes to the way that records are submitted, the decline in note-taking and the increase in digital images as well as 'single observer records'.

It also mentions the line that is drawn between 'the one that got away' and a return from the BBRC of 'not proven'.

We saw a bird today that is well into 'the one that got away' territory. Hopefully it will also be a useful learning experience. Here's the tale...

Ten to eight this morning and I was in the plantation at the entrance to Druridge Links. Janet had just called to say she arrived and asked where I was.

As I was talking a warbler popped out from some low pine and nettle vegetation and I got the briefest of views before it dropped into cover. It was a chunky looking acro, brown above, pale-creamy buff below - but the most striking thing was the way it's tail was 'cocked' pointing up the way like a cetti's warbler or sprosser holds its tail (it did this every time we saw it).

Janet arrived, I explained the situation. We got two more very brief views as it skulked about in the thick, low-lying, pine. I managed to get some detail on the bill, dark above, paler lower mandible and on the legs which looked dark. The second time it flew a little into a higher pine, still obscured, then dropping back into the low stuff it preferred. It never called. I tried a record shot, but just got over-exposed twigs. It skulked away into the vegetation. Nick Adams turned up and joined the search but we never saw it again.

Describing our bird to Dave E, he said 'shaped like a banana'  - and that's exactly what it was. I found the reference to 'shaped like a banana' - http://punkbirder.webs.com/acroholics.htm

In fact that photo that punkbirder used could have been our bird...

We had ruled out the 'bigger' acros and paddyfield. So, we probably had a Blyth's reed warbler today we didn't clinch it because we couldn't rule out reed warbler as didn't see the upper-parts for long enough to gauge primary projection and we never heard it call. So it will always be a 'one that got away'.

Viz-migging was good again today, especially earlier in the morning with pipits, skylarks and oddly, tree sparrows being really obvious, the latter headed south in small groups. There were also a few swallows and martins, small groups of pied wagtails, siskin and redpoll with a couple of  grey wags over too.

We heard, but didn't see, a yellow-browed warbler and the subalpine warbler was again in the 'Druridge bushes' north of the turning circle. We watched leave those bushes, land briefly in a lone hawthorn, then disapear into a large clump of Rosa rugosa 15 yards south of the turning circle. It may never be seen again - that rose clump is very dense!

161 golden plover

Viz-migging

An early start at Druridge this morning, making the most of the calmer conditions before the gale force winds arrived.

Walking along the road, it was soon evident that there were a lot of birds on the move. Linnets were the most obvious at first, with small parties moving south, hardly any of them stopping to feed, a few goldfinches among them too. Then a group of 12 lesser redpolls moved through, stopping briefly in the bushes.A couple of grey wagtails, my first of 2011, flew south, calling as they went.

There were also lots of hirundines and pipits moving through, along the dunes and over the bushes. I climbed to the top of the highest dune to give myself a good vantage point. I sat there for two and a half hours, just watching the spectacle of visible migration.

I always struggle to count such large numbers of birds on the move, the same with sea-watching unless I keep a tally. Swallows were the most numerous and I estimated about 350-400 per hour, then probably 150/hour house martins and less again of sand martin. I reckoned on about 100-150/hour for meadow pipits.

Throughout the morning small parties of linnet flew south and few goldfinches (but these could have been local birds?). I also had three more grey wagtails, a collared dove, three skylarks and a merlin.

There were also a LOT of racing pigeons, mainly headed south, they were just clearing the top of the dune, so close I got a couple of gliffs.

Also of note this morning was a male marsh harrier and about 360 canada geese on the stubble fields, moved on by a man with a gun, they dispersed into smaller parties.

154 grey wagtail
155 lesser redpoll