A Productive Weekend

Although as I write this the weather has changed, and the forecast looks more like something we are used to here during the winter months, rain and relative warmth, Saturday morning was actually a lot colder than I was expecting it to be.    

There was a really heavy frost across the patch, and most water bodies (except of course the river and sea) were completely iced over.  Presumably this was the case across much of the country, which may explain why I finally saw a non-Scoter duck on the sea!  

My first stop of the day on Saturday was indeed the sea front, and my first scan revealed an interesting-looking shape... 

My first view of it

 

A quick twist of the zoom and I could see it was a female Goldeneye!  Most certainly a species that can now be described as 'Patch Gold!'

Apologies for the photo quality - it was rather distant!

 

The recent decline in the frequency of patch Goldeneye records is hardly a surprise when you look at the numbers that now winter in the south west.  Their decline is really quite shocking, with sites that I have see flocks at when I visited with my Dad 15/20 years ago, now hosting just one or two wintering birds, if any at all.  Red-breasted Mergansers are clearly going the same way too.

Anyway, this was the first Goldeneye on patch since March 2016, when three briefly dropped in on the Axe Estuary north of Tower Hide..

I messaged the news out, and am pleased that it stayed put for over 20 mins, even allowing a car-less Phil to twitch it on foot...  

More zoom but fewer pixels - and correct me if I am wrong but I think I've actually manage to capture its golden eye!

 

About five minutes after Phil's arrival, it took off and flew west around Beer Head. The only other birds on the sea were the wintering two Great Crested Grebes and Common Scoter flock, as well as a couple of Red-throated Diver and a couple each of passing Fulmars and Gannets.

Phil then joined me for an hour and a half zipping around the patch covering different sites.  Next stop was the Estuary where our Avocet flock was showing - now containing eight birds which is a really decent count for us.  Also a female Gadwall of note.

Conserving body head clearly! Was going to crop this photo down more but love the light on the water and reeds at the back and the roosting gulls at the front.

 

We then headed into Axmouth, where Phil guided me on to my first Marsh Tit of 2026 (almost to the tree!).  We then came out of the valley to look at the fields between Axmouth and Rousdon - which were absolutely teeming with small birds!  Several stops revealed over 1,000 Linnet, 400+ Chaffinch, 14 Yellowhammer, 4 Reed Bunting and a few Greenfinch.  Amazing numbers, but often frustrating as they're not at all easy to get amongst and check properly. Who knows what else is hidden in the stubble up there? Will need to give it more time...

Back into the valley where there was nothing unusual at Bridge Marsh, although it was clear to see Wigeon numbers have increased a bit, with just shy of 200 birds being my recent best count.  The same can be said about Lapwing, there are far more about now than there were a few weeks ago.

So that was Saturday, and now to today, which was far-less birdy for me as I have been at work....but it was really quite 'gully'!

My first decent gull of the day was a third-winter Yellow-legged Gull on the lower Estuary for a short while at 9:15am.  Having seen several dodgy dark-mantled and often yellowish-legged hybrids over recent months, it was good to see a bird that looked the real deal.

Wasn't actually that many gulls about, this was one of less than twenty present at the time

 

Although no gull heads are visible in this pic - mantles and their colours are!  YLG left, Herring back right and GBBG near right.

 

It wasn't an easy gull to photograph and observe , thanks to the awful weather and the fact it didn't once land on dry land! 

Got several photos like this, all showing its younger wing feathers

Then this evening, a bit more gull time at the north end of the Estuary revealed the continued presence of the Yellow-legged Gull, along with my first Caspian Gull of 2026 - a first-winter that I later learnt Gav had also spied from the Tower Hide.  His photos will be much better than mine, however I'll still post what I managed in the fading light...

...with added arrow!  Surprised I even managed this to be honest

 

Although it is a huge shame to see the blue skies and frost go, it's clearly not a coincidence the first bout of Atlantic-born weather fronts of the year have produced the first flurry of decent gulls.  Every cloud has a silver lining!