Winter birding

The last of the Blackbirds from the huge invasion earlier in the month are hanging on, making their way through the remaining Hawthorn berries are the last remnant of Autumn. Otherwise it feels like winter. 

Wintering duck numbers have started to build up on the Budge fields, with Wigeon numbering about 160 but there's fewer Teal. The big pools is virtually bereft of life, I've not seen one, but I fancy there's an Otter about which will deter wildfowl from settling.

Elsewhere on the patch the 'front field' at Druridge Farm is attracting big flocks of Lapwing and Golden Plover with a maximum of 560 and 320 respectively this week. Scanning through plover flocks - proper winter birding. 

Some of the Golden Plover flock this morning

I took Thursday off work on the strength of a strengthening northerly wind which ended up as a bit of a damp squib - it came from the right place, just not for long enough. Me decision paid-off though as my flexi-day-off meant I could go to Amble to see the (American) Buff-bellied Pipit that was found the previous day. Janet and I joined a few hardy-souls at first light and after an hour or so of searching, the bird was re-found on the beach giving the assembled (socially-distant) twitchers good views. A new bird for Northumberland and the Western Palearctic for me.

Heavily-cropped shot of the Buff-bellied Pipit

Female-type Stonechat at Amble

Rock Pipit

I did go seawatching in the afternoon from 1pm to dusk. A Black-throated Diver headed north was new for the year (176), other highlights were two Velvet Scoter north and a lovely Sooty Shearwater, really close in nice light, through the breakers, before heading off north. There was decent auk passage, a few Gannets and Kittiwakes including a single flock of 37 of the latter. Full list here.

Seawatching was quiet so I was distracted by these horses

Janet and I walked the length of the patch and back on both Saturday and Sunday morning. Highlights include a Snow Bunting over, 110 Twite in the dunes (they were on the beach on Friday when it was quieter), Great-spotted Woodpecker and a late Chiffchaff which was calling like mad in the bushes - a nice reminder of Autumn.

Black-headed Gull on the sea today

Guillemot on the sea

Red-throated Loon on the sea

I'm changing my work regime from tomorrow to make better us of the daylight hours so my weekday patch visits will be at lunchtime until February. 

Some more winter birds from this week...

male Stonechat

Wren

Ringing or twitching?

I had a difficult decision to make yesterday morning - do as I had planned to do, and go to Druridge and ring some birds or go and twitch the (probable, as it was then) Broon Shrike on Holy Island?

I like seeing rare birds, especially in Northumberland but I hate twitching and I hate twitches - they usually end up disappointing, I either don't see the bird (usually because of I've put going to see it off for too long) or I do see it but the experience is disappointing. Twitching does attract the worst kind of birdwatcher, and occasionally, twitches bring out the worst in otherwise perfectly normal birdwatchers. Ethically, driving 100 miles to see a bird doesn't stack-up either.

We went ringing.

It was worthwhile, we caught 42 birds (38 new, 4 retraps). Amongst the usual autumnal species we caught two Lesser Whitethroats, both were carefully examined to eliminate rarer eastern races but nothing pointed towards to that. Lesser Whitethroats are scarce anyway but arriving with Yellow-browed Warblers (we caught one of these) in mid-October, they need to be carefully scrutinised. We caught a few Long-tailed Tits, Goldcrests, Lesser Redpolls and probably the rarest bird for the patch  - Treecreeper.

Again this was scrutinised for 'northern' race but it was a 'brittanica'.

Treecreeper

Yellow-browed Warbler

Lesser Whitethroat

Other than ringing, a Woodcock was flushed as we set the nets up, first of the autumn, and a Short-eared Owl arrived in-off the sea. It was immediately mobbed by crows that pushed it higher and higher until it disappeared off west. A female bullfinch was interesting as was a flock of 17 Greenfinch heading north over the bushes - a really notable record for the patch. 

Short-eared Owl - in-off.

I had a quick look offshore in the evening. There was strong Gannet and Kittiwake passage, a Slavonian Grebe and a handful of Red-throated Divers were on the Sea.

Juvenile Great Black-backed Gull

Friday was forecast to have lighter winds and generally settled and was time to hatch our much procrastinated plan to try and catch the finch flock in the dunes north of the turning circle, Holy Island and the Broon Shrike would have to wait.

It was windier and brighter than we would've liked but we set up two two-shelf nets through the weedy dunes where the finch-flock congregate. Whilst we were setting up, a Lapland Bunting went north, calling. 

Despite the 'nice' weather (not nice for ringing) it was quite successful, for catching Reed Buntings at least, ten of them, we also caught two Chaffinch, two Linnet and a Dunnock. This operation had potential but the window is narrow before the cows arrive.

One of ten Reed Buntings

It was quite mild in the sunshine and out of the nor'easter wind, which brought out a few insects.

Small Copper butterfly

Eupeodes sp Hoverlfy

After ringing, I had a wander around the bushes. By the turning-circle there was a Chiffchaff, Yellow-browed Warbler (the one we ringed yesterday probably) and a Lesser Whitethroat that was only seen briefly but the head looked good for an eastern-race bird. 

Wren

Goldcrest - a male, doing an impression of a squash ball

Inquisitive or miserable-looking?

I finished with a look on the sea. As I was staring out into the horizon, I was startled by a voice from below " Excuse me, are you the chap who writes the blog?"

Me - "Druridge Diary? yes that's me"

Him - " I follow it and read it regularly, I thought it must be you, so I though I'd say hello"

What a really nice thing to do. I'm pleased someone reads this. I forgot to ask his name, but whoever you are, do leave a comment below if you read this, it was really nice of you to stop and say hello!

I might go to Holy Island tomorrow...

Long day on the patch

Last night, the forecast for today was rain - all day.

So this morning, we didn't set an alarm, when we got up it wasn't raining and it was calm. The forecast still predicted showers, but we headed down to Druridge and put some nets up, you've got to make the most of any chance in the autumn. Whilst we sorting the nets, the sky was full of pink-footed geese - easily 6000 passed over. A small flock of about eight brambling flew south and a yellow-browed warbler called form the bushes by the car

There were a few showers, but they didn't really come to much, we furled a couple of nets early on but continued ringing with three nets up for the whole day. It was worth the effort, as we caught 60 birds in total of 14 different species.

Of note was a flock of lesser redpolls - we caught 10 in total, all within an hour, I think they were just passing through.

Lesser redpoll - a nice pink male

We caught a very late willow warbler (rare beyond September at Druridge), two chiffchaffs and five blackcaps. One of the blackcaps was female that we first caught in the spring as breeding female, she must've nee ready for the off as she had built up a large amount of fat (migratory birds build up fat ahead of migration).

Late willow warbler

male blackcap

female blackcap

Despite the huge arrival of thrushes yesterday, they must've all gone straight inland as we only caught two song thrush and redwing today - one of the song thrushes was a retrap, Tom Cadwallender and I caught it in October last year as first-year bird. I wonder where it's been since?

Redwing

Also of note was a magpie - Not everyone's favourite species and some it will probably end up in the farmers larsen trap. It was a first-year bird and only the second we've ever caught at Druridge. Despite they're reputation amongst 'country folk' they are incredibly intelligent and very beautiful birds.

Magpie - only the second one we've caught at Druridge

Bizarrely, we also caught our first wren of the year today. Last year we caught more wrens than any other species, but the 'beast from the east' wiped them out and there were no breeding bird at Druridge this year. The five we caught today will be post-breeding dispersers from elsewhere.

wren - first of the year!

Today was also WeBS count day. As the Budge fields are still pretty-much dry it didn't take too long and there wasn't much of note.

As I was packing up the nets at about 4pm, the skies cleared and the sun came out. I stopped by the plantation and birded until nearly 6pm. Most of that time was spent trying to get detail on a grey-looking phylosc in the sycamores. It was really tricky to get decent views, but it was a chiffchaff, very grey/off-white below and grey above apart from green in the wings - it looked like a Siberian chiff,  it eventually called and gave its ID away as just that. I only managed a very poor, arse-end photo.

Territory mapping: Visit B

An early start at Druridge this morning for my second mapping visit of the breeding season. A little bit of light rain first thing soon cleared to leave a bright, sunny morning.

Generally, it seemed quieter than ten days ago, which is a little odd. Skylark and meadow pipit numbers are back up to full strength and it was really encouraging to see a pair of stonechats carrying nesting material and at least five pairs of grey partridges and eight singing reed buntings.. Worrying though was the lack of dunnocks (1 singing male) and wrens (two singing males).

male stonechat

female stonechat with nesting material

On the migrant front, two more swallows were logged and at last, three wheatears were added to the list.

one of three wheatears

In the dunes, the common dog violets are flowering amongst the even more common dog shit.

common dog violet

 93 wheatear

Hard Work

I find birding the patch at this time of year hard work.- Once the initial flurry of year ticks is over in the first couple of weeks of January, it becomes harder until the first of the spring migrants turn up in March.

Until then, I'll keep slogging away. It won't be long before the first wheatears, chiffchaffs and sandwich terns arrive. Before them the Shelducks will be back in February.

I walked out to Low Chibburn Preceptory today, to see if anything of interest was roosting in it. It's an interesting place, having served various uses from hospital for pilgrims, a dower house and a World War II look out.

Artist's impression of how Low Chibburn may have appeared in the 1400s. Drawn by Terry Ball.

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 This is how it looks today

There wasn't any birds there, but there were some fresh barn owl pellets. Walking back by the farm I added wren, song thrush, robin and reed bunting to the year list.

The sea was miles out but I did manage to add a solitary gannet to the list.

55 robin
56 song thrush
57 reed bunting
58 wren
59 jackdaw
60 gannet