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Wednesday 29 April 2009

More Border Hopping And 'The Fudge' Revisited

In my last post you will see a very rubbish picture of the male Ferruginous Duck we 'twitched' in Somerset. Roger Musgrove later emailed me to inform me how easy it actually was to get closer to the bird. All we had to do was carry on along the main track...bums!

He also kindly sent me some 'proper' photos of it, so I could see what it actually looked like! Here's one of them...

That's more like it!

Thanks Roger, hope to bump into you when I next venture into Somerset....though that may be a few years away!!!

Now to today, I spent a few hours out in the morning seeing very little. The highlight was easily a huge brown Saker-type falcon that I flushed from my 'Woodcock Woods', it was MASSIVE!!! Last seen flying towards Colyton.... look out!

I had a few bits and bobs to do later on in the morning, but at 13:00, knowing Portland's MEGA was still present I just had to go. WHAT A BIRD! Stunning male Collared Flycatcher! I didn't even bother trying to get a photo of it, because no one is going to get a better photo than THIS. Viewing it was quite tricky, for this reason....

Lots of heads, hats, backs and scopes in the way!

Bun and myself still enjoyed some excellent views of it though, what a stonking bird! Well worth it! Thanks must go to the Bird Obs and the finders of the Flycatcher. Nice to see a few familiar faces again too.

We spent a good hour and half here, before we went to Radipole, where I finally got to see this...

Slightly better than my last effort at scarce wildfowl photography!

Look, you can even count its tail feathers....if you are that way inclined!

For some reason the Hooded Merganser really had it in for a pair of Tufted Ducks, and spent virtually all the time we were watching it chasing them, non-stop! Also here a couple of Gadwall and too many Brown Rats!!!

We then headed home, via a quick stop in Whitford just before 18:00 where we had some super views of the singing male
Lesser Whitethroat alongside the railway.

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