I heard back from the Norwegian chap about the colour ringed herring gull I saw at Amble Harbour last week:
CR-Code Blue ring with white code for large gulls 4 digits LBBW(J3LJ);RBMRinging Centre Stavanger (Norway) Ring number FA29729Species Herring Gull Larus argentatus Sex Unknown Age Pullus
Date24.06 2007
PlaceHerreholmen, Lyngdal, Vest-Agder, Norway
Coordinates58°02'02"N 006°57'51"E
-
21.02 2008
Amble-by-the-Sea, Northumberland, Great Britain
55°20'02"N 001°34'04"W
Robson, Iain
242/601/243
02.01 2009
Amble Harbour, Northumberland, Northumberland, Great Britain
55°20'12"N 001°34'34"W
Bone, Sara
558/602/243
31.01 2009
Amble-by-the-Sea, Northumberland, Great Britain
55°20'02"N 001°34'04"W
Robson, Iain
587/601/243
It must like Amble!
Monday, 9 February 2009
Sunday, 8 February 2009
Year list off to a start
Druridge on Saturday morning -grim!
I finaly managed to get down to Druridge at the weekend. I went on saturday, briefly, until the weather beat me. It was grim!
I did manage to see a flock of golden plover on the fields to the north and a nice buzzard perched on the fence at the back of the Budge Fields. The intermittent snow/sleet/rain/hail showers became more frequent add to that the biting northerly wind, it was all too much. I went home and made some tree sparrow nestboxes.
Today was a much better day, the wind had dropped and had gone to the west and there was no snow/sleet.....no precipitations of any type, so I bashed the patch. I started by waling to the north then along the haul road, a pair of buzzard, were interacting above one of the shelterbelts - who would've thought, 10 years ago, that buzzard would be on the patch list before sprawk and kestrel at Druridge! There was a good count of meadow pipit today with six by the bushes and at least 12 along the haul road.
So the year list stands at 54, not a bad start considering the weather!
1 black-headed gull
2 curlew
3 golden plover
4 redshank
5 lapwing
6 dunlin
7 carrion crow
8 jackdaw
9 grey heron
10 magpie
11 buzzard
12 song thrush
13 robin
14 blackbird
15 wren
16 meadow pipit
17 dunnock
18 whooper swan
19 grey partridge
20 fieldfare
21 mistle thrush
22 pheasant
23 pink-footed goose
24 mute swan
25 pied wagtail
26 goldfinch
27 linnet
28 redwing
29 moorhen
30 rook
31 jackdaw
32 starling
33 snipe
34 rock dove (skemmie)
35 chaffinch
36 great tit
37 house sparrow
38 grey wagtail
39 canada goose
40 goldeneye
41 teal
42 wigeon
43 mallard
44 greylag goose
45 tufted duck
46 gadwall
47 woodpigeon
48 stonechat
49 sanderling
50 red-throated diver
51 shag
52 herring gull
53 razorbill
54 twite
I finaly managed to get down to Druridge at the weekend. I went on saturday, briefly, until the weather beat me. It was grim!
I did manage to see a flock of golden plover on the fields to the north and a nice buzzard perched on the fence at the back of the Budge Fields. The intermittent snow/sleet/rain/hail showers became more frequent add to that the biting northerly wind, it was all too much. I went home and made some tree sparrow nestboxes.
Today was a much better day, the wind had dropped and had gone to the west and there was no snow/sleet.....no precipitations of any type, so I bashed the patch. I started by waling to the north then along the haul road, a pair of buzzard, were interacting above one of the shelterbelts - who would've thought, 10 years ago, that buzzard would be on the patch list before sprawk and kestrel at Druridge! There was a good count of meadow pipit today with six by the bushes and at least 12 along the haul road.
A stubble field had attracted a mixed flock of linnet and goldfinch and a flock of 50+ fieldfares with a few redwings among them. That was all th winter thrushes on the list with the mistle thrush on the fence and song thrush walloping snails offuv a glass bottle in the dunes. By High Chibburn, there 19 whooper swans in the fields with a few mutes, a grey wag flew over the farm buildings.
Back towards dru a pair of stonechat were by the entrance. On the pool, there was flock of 37 canada geese, unusual for Druridge, they must've been frozen off elsewhere, 12 greylags were also on the pool with 5 goldeneye and reasonable number of wigeon and teal. One of the otters was at the west side.
Offshore, the tide was in but there wasn't much to see, 3 red-throated divers, a handful of shag and a north-flying razorbill.
So the year list stands at 54, not a bad start considering the weather!
1 black-headed gull2 curlew
3 golden plover
4 redshank
5 lapwing
6 dunlin
7 carrion crow
8 jackdaw
9 grey heron
10 magpie
11 buzzard
12 song thrush
13 robin
14 blackbird
15 wren
16 meadow pipit
17 dunnock
18 whooper swan
19 grey partridge
20 fieldfare
21 mistle thrush
22 pheasant
23 pink-footed goose
24 mute swan
25 pied wagtail
26 goldfinch
27 linnet
28 redwing
29 moorhen
30 rook
31 jackdaw
32 starling
33 snipe
34 rock dove (skemmie)
35 chaffinch
36 great tit
37 house sparrow
38 grey wagtail
39 canada goose
40 goldeneye
41 teal
42 wigeon
43 mallard
44 greylag goose
45 tufted duck
46 gadwall
47 woodpigeon
48 stonechat
49 sanderling
50 red-throated diver
51 shag
52 herring gull
53 razorbill
54 twite
Wednesday, 4 February 2009
Ipin's Birding Trips
Rather than clog my blog (it rhymes!) with non-druridge stuff like trips, I've created another blog for that kind of stuff: Ipin's birding Trips . I've just started putting the India stuff on there, which I'll try to get done over the next few weeks. If I get time, I'll try and put some older trip stuff on there too....check it out!
Still not been to Druridge, no work and no footie this weekend so I'll kick the year list of then.
Still not been to Druridge, no work and no footie this weekend so I'll kick the year list of then.
Saturday, 31 January 2009
India
Regular followers of this blog may have noticed a lack of news from the pools lately? Well, I've just come back from a fantastic 16 day trip to northern India and the Himalayan foothills, photo's and tails from the trip will follow later, but here is one to wet your appetites...
To try and recover from two weeks of eating curry and rice we went to to Amble to get Fish and Chips this afternoon.
Among the feeding frenzy of leftovers, there was a colour ringed herring gull, the same colour ringed herring gull I saw there last February http://ipinswildlifeblog.blogspot.com/2008/03/gull-update.html J3LJ was first ringed as a pullus in Vest -Agder, Norway on 24th June 2007. I will email the chap in Norway to see if it has been spotted elsewhere since.
I'm off to get some immodium.....
To try and recover from two weeks of eating curry and rice we went to to Amble to get Fish and Chips this afternoon.
Among the feeding frenzy of leftovers, there was a colour ringed herring gull, the same colour ringed herring gull I saw there last February http://ipinswildlifeblog.blogspot.com/2008/03/gull-update.html J3LJ was first ringed as a pullus in Vest -Agder, Norway on 24th June 2007. I will email the chap in Norway to see if it has been spotted elsewhere since.
I'm off to get some immodium.....
Sunday, 11 January 2009
Funny
Someone sent me this and it made me laugh, hope it makes you laugh too. No birding this weekend, work yesterday and it's too windy today.
Sunday, 4 January 2009
Dipped
We went to smoggy-land to to twitch the glaucous winged gull today - we didn't see it.... I hate twitching!
We did the birdrace yesterday and as usual we didn't do too well, but we didn't embarrass ourselves, I think we were 5th out of 7 teams with 101 as our total. We missed some easy stuff including shoveler, red grouse and reed bunting, we also dipped the Hauxley white-fronts and bean goose and just got pink-footed goose, our last bird of the day! We did see some good birds including marsh tit, kingfisher, ruff and dipper.
The winners with 113 (I think) was 'The Casuals' (Muriel and Tom Cadwallender, John Richardson and Neil Anderson) - well done to them! We helped them celebrate their win with some food and wine afterwards.
All in all, a good day, I do enjoy the winter bird race, it's quite a sociable event, with teams meeting during the day and at the end in the pub to declare their totals. If you've never done a winter bird race - give it a go.....it's far better than twitching!
We did the birdrace yesterday and as usual we didn't do too well, but we didn't embarrass ourselves, I think we were 5th out of 7 teams with 101 as our total. We missed some easy stuff including shoveler, red grouse and reed bunting, we also dipped the Hauxley white-fronts and bean goose and just got pink-footed goose, our last bird of the day! We did see some good birds including marsh tit, kingfisher, ruff and dipper.
The winners with 113 (I think) was 'The Casuals' (Muriel and Tom Cadwallender, John Richardson and Neil Anderson) - well done to them! We helped them celebrate their win with some food and wine afterwards.
All in all, a good day, I do enjoy the winter bird race, it's quite a sociable event, with teams meeting during the day and at the end in the pub to declare their totals. If you've never done a winter bird race - give it a go.....it's far better than twitching!
Friday, 2 January 2009
Mowdyman
It's the end of the 2nd of Jan and I've still not been to Druridge.
We did get out west to do Janet's atlas tetrads before the end of the year, thye are two together near Raylees. It is the wild west out there alright, not much bird-wise though, a few small groups of fieldfares were all of note.
We did come across this gruesome sight by the A68, A line of dead mowdies...Mowdy is an old Northumberland (and Cumberland I think) term for moles and their molehills are called mowdy hawkins...not sure what the man who got these poor critters would be called, the mowdyman maybe?
The method of hanging the dead on the fence goes back along way, there was no way the mowdyman could show his boss how good a job he was doing, so he would hang the carcasses on the fence, you rarely see it nowadays. Seemingly one moleman in Catton in the South Tyne had a line of 478 dead moles strung on a fence that he had caught at one farm.
After we did the tetrads, I took these pics at Janet's feeders..
Tomorrow is bird race day, our team had done bugger all preperation, but it shouldn't matter cos we are always last even when we do prepare.
We did get out west to do Janet's atlas tetrads before the end of the year, thye are two together near Raylees. It is the wild west out there alright, not much bird-wise though, a few small groups of fieldfares were all of note.
We did come across this gruesome sight by the A68, A line of dead mowdies...Mowdy is an old Northumberland (and Cumberland I think) term for moles and their molehills are called mowdy hawkins...not sure what the man who got these poor critters would be called, the mowdyman maybe?
The method of hanging the dead on the fence goes back along way, there was no way the mowdyman could show his boss how good a job he was doing, so he would hang the carcasses on the fence, you rarely see it nowadays. Seemingly one moleman in Catton in the South Tyne had a line of 478 dead moles strung on a fence that he had caught at one farm.
After we did the tetrads, I took these pics at Janet's feeders..
Tomorrow is bird race day, our team had done bugger all preperation, but it shouldn't matter cos we are always last even when we do prepare.
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