Tour of the patch

SE 5 , overcast, mild

It looked good for ringing at Dru this morning, but JF had gone to spurn to ring mega's so I had a tour of the patch instead and to be honest, felt a bit guilty, it was the first time I had been as far as Low Chibburn since the spring. I was rewarded with a year tick......tree sparrow! there were three in the hedge between the preciptory and farm. Not much else to report, on the beach was little gathering of arctic and sandwich terns with a rosy amongst them, also 16 sanderling and 5 dunlin. Offshore there was 8 red throats, 60+ common scoter and lots of gannet fishing with more great-black-backs around a boat. A cracking bonxie moved north as did a single manxie and arctic skua.

137 tree sparrow

Recovering.....

I am still recovering from a VERY muddy weekend at the Leeds Festival so have not been to Dru, might get down tommorrow after work

top: deep mud on Thursday night before most people had even turned up!

More mud!

The girlies in their fancy dress

Incapable of drinkin my own beer!

Tonight at Dru

Had to go to Dru this afternoon to meet Alex from NWT to chat about COWS! and....there seemed to be lots of mig's about. From the trackt to the hides, there were at least six willy wobs. From the Budge Screen we had a female marsh harrier flying south towards to Cresswell and lots of phyloscs calling from the bushes.

After the meeting and we saw a reed warbler lumbering through the umbelifers, spotfly in the bushes and lots more willy wobs. IF turned up and had a little egretr on the Budge Fields. It had a good feeling that 'something' would be about, shame I am Leeds Festival for the next few days...no doubt JF will get the nets up and catch a mega in my absence

136 reed warbler

Dipped...again

I went to durham to look for the black stork that I didn't get to see yesterday cos I was caked in soot. Just before lunchtime, it moved from Northumberland to Durham (Clara Vale to be precise) so I shot down there, only to be told it had flown off south. with no other plan I headed for Newburn where it has been hanging about, no sign of it there either, so I gave up and went back to County Hell. seemingly it was in Crawcrook this evening before flying of east after 8pm.

Maybe it might fly to Druridge? Maybe pigs might fly to Druridge?

Sooty...but not shearwater

This is what I looked like on both Saturday and Sunday evenings after we spent most of the weekend ripping out my fireplaces....only dirtier. First to go was the sitting room one, easy...smashed up the concrete and took out the bricks.

Sitting room fireplace - easy peasy

Next to go was the kitchen, now this one had plastered over then wallpapered, so when I discovered the original stone lintels, i decided to open it right out and put a wood stove in there. Well we did the impossible, we emptied out three times as much brick, stone, dust, soot and plaster as there was possibly room for. We managed to fill a skip, a hole in the ground and have enough spare bricks to rebuild the house.....then there was the dust, it was everywhere, not only on everything in the kitchen but also on and in us....black bogies was just the start!!!

Kitchen fireplace, complete with tools for the job - hoover, brush and shovel, bucket and STELLA!

So, as you can imagine, I didn't get much birding done, though I did sneak down to Dru on Sunday to clear my lungs. It was very bright and very breezy, so no good for ringing (and Saturday was write-off due to rain. Not much to report either...very quiet.

This ship has been lurking in the bay for a week or so, I thought it might be surveying for windfarms. She is called Tridens 1, so I googled her and found this amazing website which shows all of the ships moving around the coast http://www.shipais.com/ zoom in on the northeast to see what's about. Tridens 1 is a fisheries research vessel from the Netherlands:

Name: Tridens 1
MMSI: 245245000 [NL]
IMO: 6812833
Callsign: PIAO
Speed/Dir: 3.6 kts / 328° NNW
Status: Underway
Dest: Blyth
ETA: Aug20 08:00
Type: Dredger/Underwater Ops. (33)
Details: Fisheries Research Vessel
Size: 61m x 10m x 4.4m
Tonnage: 934gt
Built: 1967
Received: 22:15:07 11 Aug 08 BST

Amazing eh?

maybe it's looking for my killer whale and dolphins which have now all gone, there were 2 harbour porpoise on Sunday though.

Here are some pics from Friday morning:

reed bunting

lesser whitethroat

meadow brown

small skipper I think...though am happy to be corrected......

Migration....not really

Well, I went down to Dru yesterday morning and there was some migration going on, there were plenty willy wobblers and chiffs in the bushes, as well as a lesser whitethroat, tho little else of note.

A very quick ringing sesh with JF in the evening...so quick we only caught two birds!!! A willow warb and a blue tit, hmph.

The weather has changed now and it looks bright and breezy tomorrow so will have to rip out fireplaces instead.....ho hum.

Another rainy autumn day

It's even more rainy and more autumnal tonight with a howling northerly making it distinctly cold, meaning our strom petrel ringing session was off.

Still it might not be an ill-wind at Dru tomorrow....Seawatching might be on the cards, as might ringing tommorrow evening if JF gets over to the coast, imagine a two-barred crossbill on the pools list (there's three on the Northern Isles today), I might even get to ring it cos JF has already done one???

Whatever, I will try and at least have a wander about before work tomorrow and to be honest a rb shrike would do me....watch this space.

I just added a new link to BirdLife Malta's Youtube channel - check it out http://www.youtube.com/BirdLifeMT