Farnes Blog

I've just discovered that Steely (the head warden on the Farne Islands) has, at last, got a Farnes blog....after much nagging. Check it out http://farnephoto.blogspot.com/

Just in time for them to come of the islands for winter...

Jack's been out

Jack frost has certainly been out this weekend...brrrrrrr.

Sorry for the lack of posts lately - it's hard work during the short days!

Only got down to Dru briefly this afternoon, had to work yesterday. We were going to trial the big whooshnet today but the ground was so frozen we couldn't get the poles in...oh and Janet lost some of it!

So we had a wander around the reserve and went looking for the elusive twite. We walked north to Chibburn Mouth, but didn't see any and there are no sign of any by Bell's farm. If anybody does come across them, please let me know. We bumped into Stef McElwee looking for the snow goose that has been at East Chevington for the last couple of days. It's an interesting one, it's the same bird that has been at Holywell for the last week or so. It was with greylags (so it's bound to be an escape), it's now with pink feets (so it has to be real)...There were 3500-4000 pinkfeets in the fields north of the preceptory but I didn't see the snow goose - could I tick it if I had?

I've not got it on my Druridge list - I bet a few people have ticked it this weekend?

Stef was good enough to phone me as I wandered off to point out a little egret that had flown south over his head, it must've flown over us too - we saw it flying off over the pines at the entrance, it'll be finding feeding difficult with all the small shallow pools frozdid.

A bit of a rant now, the County Records Committee has booted out our barred warbler record from the floods...grrrrr..it won't be coming of my list though - f*#k em! It would appear that to have a record accepted, one should have attended a two-week creative writing course to enable one convey the excitement of the find, maybe the Bird Club could put on a couple of courses? Not much point in submitting the marsh warbler - lots of singing and brief glimpse - someone else can submit it, it's staying on my list!

And another thing......I get my pager messages via text messages from RBA rather than have a pager, each message costs me about 12p. I have the local channel on in case anything turns up at Dru I should know about. Can I make it clear now that I do not want to know about crossbills at wallsend, siskins at whitley bay, 3 whooper swans at Bolam, pink footed geese anywhere (especially Holywell) and especially not willow tit at Holywell....why do people bother phoning the pager company to put birds like this on?

There are thousands of pfg's everywhere, there are 60 whoopers in Druridge Bay - why do I want to know about 40 geese at Holywell or 3 whoopers at Bolam bloody Lake!

Wintery weather

The first real winter weather this weekend, I had to work yesterday, taking a couple of journo's for a walk around Howick and Craster, not much opportunity for birding though (I was at work after all), because of the extreme cold and wind, we had to retreat to the ship at Newton for lunch - tough! Did have a peregrine at Cullernose Point. Below is the Bathing House from the south and Cullernose Point with Dunstanburgh Castle in the background.

At Druridge this morning there was even more snow but it was nice and bright. We did the WeBS count and just wandered around the patch. There were geese and swans on the move, mainly south, but the whoopers seemed to be all over the place, making then difficult to count, there were at least 30 though, I managed to catch this lot going north by Chibburn Farm.

On the pools, the wigeon and teal numbers were up a bit with 50ish of each. When we arrived at Dru I predicted that today looked like a good day to finally nail peregine for the year and I was right. As we wandered towards the haul road, the waders, gulls and starlings on the fields to north all went up in a chaotic swirl - it had to be a peregrine, it was! In the sunshine it looked incredibly bright,an adult male judging by its size chasing golden plovers, it failed and went to sit in the middle of the fields, too far away to photograph. I've been waiting for one of these all autumn having failed to see one in the spring (when they are trickier), I thought I would dip, only to see one on in the first January visit.

As we walked towards Chibburn Farm, it came back over the fields containing some of the 250-300 golden plover, 200 Lapwing and 200 black-headed gulls along with starlings, corvids and other random gulls.










In the bushes there were quite a few thrushes, dunnocks, robins and wrens, nothing out of the ordinary. We called it a day at half one and retreated to the tearoom at Widdrington Village for lunch......

160 peregrine

A good weekend

Well I had a great weekend at the Scottish Ringers conference in Breamar, tho I am now ill, not the winter vomiting bug the hotel was infected with or the drink, but some evil bug (not helped by getting a soaking at work yesterday).

Scottish ringers is certainly a friendly do, more so than the English version I'm told, I've always found the Scot's to be very friendly generally. The organisation and line up of speakers was excellent and set in a very scenic place and I also managed to catch up with a few old friends

Our team won the quiz, mostly due to Ian Fisher and his encyclopedic (anal?) knowledge of birds - we even let him keep the prize (well, most of it).

Ian, hanging on to his prize, before the rest of it disappears

Here are some of the other Northumberland contingent:

Hugh Hanmer

Martin Davidson with his feet up...

Keith 'two-pints'Brookes

Martin trying to get quiz answers from Jaqcui (BTO)

I called at Dru on Monday to put some twite food down (inspired by Dave Sowter's talk at the NTBC on Thursday night). No twite yet, but still 50+ goldfinch with a few more greenies, chaffinch and a reed bunt. Look like snow is forecast for Friday and Saturday, might be an opportunity to bring the twite in?

Some of the goldfinch flock

My mate Dave has a new CD out, check out his MySpace site: http://www.myspace.com/wingandaprayer373

Quickie

A very quick stop by at Dru on the way to work this morning, so quick I saw no birds!

Not quite true, there 50+ goldfinches at the twite food with 4 chaffinches, 3 blackbirds, 2 magpies, 1 linnet, 1 great tit and 1 crow. BUT NO BLIMMIN TWITE!

No birding and no blog activity for a day or two now cossov work stuff and them am off to the Scottish Ringers conference in Braemar. Our former County recorder tells me he has a bit of reputation at these do's, must take the camera and catch him in action...watch this space!

As for me I won't be touchin a drop!

Photo's

I didn't get any photo's of the bluetail or the wheatear, but others did. Check out Tom Tams and Richard Dunns websites and John Malloys blog for some cracking images. I was stuck in the office all day, so couldn't get down to Newbiggin Mound for the pallas's, humes yb and yb warblers, not sure if the latter two were seen today?

Will hopefully be checking Dru out before work tomorrow.

Twitching (Patchworker shirks his duties)

Pathchworker, that's what I am! So I was off to Dru (later than usual...you guessed it with a hangover (Friends Birthday Party) with a bag of twite food, not even out of me village when a I got a message about about a desert wheatear at Lynemouth Power Station, UUUUeeeeeeee....

So there's me wading through a lunar landscape in the pissing rain (I even beat Andy Cowell there) to join Jimmy Steele and Dave Elliott (the finder) to see this cracking male dessie - what a bird! no pics sadly but I managed to capture the scene, nice!

So the off to Dru when I get message saying the red-flanked blue tail has been seen again on Holy Island. Hardly time to feed the twite, collect Janet and some food and head north. The tide was ebbing John Richardson was waiting for no tide....we followed his lead....

It looked like a needle in haystack job, little gen to go on - desperate birders stared into gardens and bushes, no sign.....rain fell.

Blue tail twitch

But the skies cleared, hope was resumed, then a message...rfbt at Lindisfarne Hotel, and it was, being chased by the same robin Andy Mould had it chased by earlier and in time for me to see it and make it back to see the match in the boozer - Game On!

sadly, I went to the Phant (The White Elephant in North Seaton), sadly the toon lost, oh well, you can't win em all.....