Avocets, Osprey and Gropper still

I have a couple of blog posts in the making at the moment, but I just wanted to slip this one in with all the latest from the house.

As I write this, sat in the conservatory with the back doors wide open, I can hear the 81st species of bird added to my lockdown house list.  Earlier this morning Phil found a couple of Avocet on Black Hole Marsh, which pleasingly I saw tonight during my evening exercise walk.  Once I had returned home a bedroom window vigil failed to show them, but they have been calling sporadically since it's got dark - which is rather nice as it happens to be one of my favourite wader calls.  This is what they looked like on Black Hole Marsh earlier this evening...

They were in stunning plumage, and on size a male and female

Species number 80 was an slightly overdue one, with a male Bullfinch (scoped I must add - it wasn't close!) late afternoon yesterday.

Back to today, and I was thrilled to see my fifth Osprey of the spring, which flew very low north over Primrose Way at 16:30.  So often when the gulls take off and start giving that distinctive 'there's a raptor coming' alarm call, it can take a while before you actually spot what it is that has spooked them.  Sometimes, well quite often really, you don't spot it at all.  But this time I looked up and it was right there just above roof top height, so impressive that I actually said "wow" out loud!  Of course by the time I got the camera out it was further north and had begun circling up, but I managed to grab the below pic.  This was our second Osprey of the day, as Kevin saw another fly NE over his place at 14:50.

A distinctive bird with broken tips on two of the primaries on its right wing, as well as the obvious wing moult

The other very exciting news I have to share is that my reeling neighbour - the Grasshopper Warbler I first discovered from my back garden five days ago - is amazingly still here!  Bizarre really as where he is looks nothing like traditional breeding Gropper habitat at all, I wouldn't even think to look for a migrant one there! It's basically just a hedge in between two intensively managed ecologically barren crop fields.  Still, there must be something he likes, and although throughout the day he doesn't make a sound, from about 19:45 he's been reeling almost non-stop til around 21:15. Such a treat - I can actually hear him whilst lying in bed!

A couple of evenings ago I went back out into the field hoping to see him.  No luck there, but his vocal performance was off the scale...

Stay safe everyone.

A Flurry of Spring Ticks

Thought it was about time I gave you all a lockdown house list update.  And as expected there's been a nice flurry of ticks over the past few days.

My lockdown house list now stands at 79, and the recent additions include a whopping three full fat house ticks. Seriously impressive considering I've lived here for over seven years, and it just shows what a little extra effort can achieve. I'll start with today, which ended in the most exciting way...

At 4pm today I was stunned to hear a Grasshopper Warbler reeling briefly whilst in my back garden, twice, which was handy as that confirmed nicely I wasn't hearing things.  The first record for the house and another spring migrant I was fully expecting not to connect with this year.

After these two short bursts of reeling, I remained in the garden for the next half hour, and sporadically popped out there until 6.30pm, but there was no further sound of it.  Being a Gropper though, I was hopeful it may start up again later in the evening, and at 8.20pm it did just that.  As soon as I heard it again from the garden I nipped out the front door and jumped into the field next to my house.

Although it never showed, I was treated to the most vocal migrant Gropper I have ever come across. It was still going strong beyond 9pm, and the experience got even better when a Barn Owl began quartering the field I was crouched in! Just amazing. Aren't birds brilliant.




Today was a gloriously sunny day, like most of the previous lockdown days. And like all the other sunny days I've spent most of it in the garden... which of course means I've been looking up!  The skies have been busy too, with the highlight being my first Hobby of the year over low east early afternoon.  There's been plenty of raptors up all day, with numerous Common Buzzards as usual, five different Sparrowhawks (two displaying), two Kestrels (one displaying), and the day started in fine form with two Peregrines tussling and calling to each other low overhead when I first opened the back doors this morning.  I am so so lucky to live where I do.

Peregrine

Sparrowhawk

Common Buzzard

The Hobby represented the eighth species of raptor recorded from my house during lockdown. A ninth will be a good one whatever it is...

Also today Whimbrel was added to the lockdown house list, about time as they've been on the Axe in varying numbers for a week or two now.

Yesterday produced a nil result, but Monday gave another house first!  During a window watch over the valley in the evening, just as I was trying to work out what the large plover-sized wader was that I was watching flying north over Black Hole Marsh, it banked around revealing black wing-pits.  Grey Plover is a good Axe bird, and it reminded me that the previous evening whilst stood in the back garden, amongst a burst of Redshank calls I thought I heard Grey Plover call once but couldn't be sure.

Sunday finally rewarded me for my daily scoping of the only bit of Axe Cliff Golf Course I can see from my back garden, which is over a mile away...

Maybe distant and small, but potential is there...

When I posted the below photo on Twitter it opened the flood gates to a flurry of sarcastic remarks - as to be expected.  But it depicts one of the reasons I have been scoping this far away golf green so often, for a Red-legged Partridge!  There were actually two of them on view just before I grabbed this shockingly poor (come on it's over a mile away and taken with my mobile!) photo...

No it's not a rabbit!  

Red-legged Partridge was a full fat house tick.  But it didn't end there for my lockdown ticks, as this scope view on Sunday also gave me Yellowhammer (thankfully a bright male - otherwise it would have been unidentifiable) and Skylark.

Saturday morning began with a Willow Warbler singing from trees next to the back garden.  A species that hasn't been in anyway numerous this spring. The crystal clear mornings aren't conducive to dropping migrants - and Saturday morning was practically the first cloudy and damp morning that we've had all April!

And that brings me all up to date.

What a thrilling post this was to write, one that is positively bursting with decent birds.  And I didn't leave home once.  Lockdown listing isn't just great fun, but it's making me appreciate far more, and look closer at, the vast array of wildlife that's not just on my doorstep, but can quite literally be seen from it.

Moor Than Meets The Eye

Roll back to 2016, and I spent much of the summer walking across East Dartmoor with Chris Townend and Paul Kemp. The aim was to survey every kilometre of East Dartmoor Moorland, twice, between mid April and mid August. This was for a project devised by RSPB and Moor Than Meets The Eye.

It was exceedingly hard work and extremely tiring. Each 1km square had four 1km transect lines within it, and we'd try and do four or five squares per morning - that's a lot of walking!  To get the squares done we'd start at dawn and often skimp on coffee stops. And because we were walking along set transect lines and not footpaths, walls, fences, bogs, gorse, angry cattle, etc, were frequently in our way.  But my god was it all worthwhile...

Virtually every single survey gave us at least one reward. Whether it was a bird or other wildlife sighting, or quite simply a view, there was pretty much always something. I found it really interesting and enjoyable to learn so much more about Dartmoor than what I knew beforehand, and getting the chance to visit so many places that I'd never been to before.

Looking north from Rippon Tor

Some of my most memorable wildlife highlights from these surveys include seeing a Dartmoor born and bred young Curlew (a true rarity), a couple of herds of Red Deer and my best ever views of Grasshopper Warblers (we recorded so many of these!). It was just so nice though to be surrounded by birds I don't see day in day out on the Axe, with breeding (and frequently drumming) Snipe, Whinchats, Tree Pipits, Redpolls and Redstarts aplenty, along with a few Ring Ouzels and almost daily Cuckoos. Regarding the last species, I can still picture the three male Cuckoos flying around over my head chasing a 'bubbling' female. Amazing stuff, and quite frankly some really weird noises too. Thanks again Chris and Paul, and the team at RSPB and MTMTE for making this happen.

Young Curlew

Grasshopper Warbler

So why have I written this blog now? Well a few days ago this dropped on to my doormat...

Yes the final report is out, and it's fab. From cover to cover this report is full of top quality raw data, which is compared with data collected back in 1979. This reveals some very interesting results, plenty of decreases which sadly is to be expected but some surprising increases too.  Crucially, the strict methodology used to collect the data in 2016 ensures it can be easily replicated in future years and comparisons easily made.

If you want to have a browse of this report, you'll find it on the Moor Than Meets The Eye website HERE.

If these surveys are done again at some point in the future, would I conduct them again if asked?  You bet I would - with absolute pleasure. What a privilege this whole project was and I'd do it again in a heartbeat.
 

Gotcha Gropper

It was a lovely still and cloudy dawn this morning, which got me out the door nice and early again. A quick look around Black Hole and Seaton Marshes was disappointing, but Axe Cliff beckoned as the conditions were just too good.

It was however quiet for new migrants, unlike Portland today which seems to be having another good day. My hour walk revealed just three new migrant passerines in the bushes; a Willow Warbler, a new Whitethroat (saw four this morning) and this invisible reeler...

Yes I did it - I got my Gropper! You will probably need to turn up the sound and listen carefully to the above YouTube clip, but that's all I can offer you I'm afraid as per usual for a spring migrant Grasshopper Warbler it didn't show. I am so happy to get one of these on my Patchwork Challenge year list, because if you miss out on Gropper in the spring, you have probably missed them for the year - autumn ones are hard to catch up with here.

It was nice to get some better views of the very vocal but highly elusive Lesser Whitethroat on today's visit, although a completely clear view was only just about manageable...

And here's one of the Common Whitethroats, this particular individual has been in since Wednesday...

Whilst walking through a field of Rapeseed it was a bit odd to suddenly hear some Brent Geese calling, but I couldn't see a thing. I did eventually get to see them when I arrived at the first decent viewpoint over the sea, a nice flock of eight Pale-bellied Brent Geese...

They soon swam in towards the rocks just east of the river mouth, and began feeding here...

All in all a rather pleasant morning out with a nice bit of variety. Oh I do love spring.

Catching Up...

Well I had a feeling the blog posts would start drying up, but I won't apologise because spending so much time on Dartmoor is proving an incredible experience. I have seen so many birds and I know you all already know, the scenery is absolutely stunning.  I am delighted to be part of the team that is mapping bird numbers and distributions on Dartmoor for the Moor Than Meets The Eye project (http://www.moorthanmeetstheeye.org/).

Sadly we can't always park this close to the survey areas!

A singing Grasshopper Warbler in silhouette 

And spending so much time out on the moor means we encounter more than just birds...

Adder

I do have a bit of patch bird news to tell, rewind back to 21st May and it was one of those days I was not enjoying missing!  Although not all that much was seen off the patch in the first few hours of the day, Lyme Regis and Sidmouth had seen a nice selection of skuas and a heap of passing waders.  Early afternoon though Dan at Sidmouth really upped the grippage with two Pom Skuas and a Storm Petrel - ouch.   I wasn't home until late afternoon, but immediately made a bee-line for the seafront.

I was really lucky to get down there when I did, about 40 minutes into the watch the weather completely changed. All the cloud and showers cleared through, the wind dropped off and the sea went almost flat calm.  I would have loved to have got here sooner, but I still managed a few nice highlights.  Best of all being a lovely pale phased Pomarine Skua west at 18:25. It seemed to be a full adult, with a long stiff tail but no spoon on the end.  What was best about this was five minutes earlier a pale phased Arctic Skua flew west, albeit much further out.  I am always worried we throw some Poms away here with the distance some of our skuas pass, but seeing these two flying in the same direction in such a short space of time has eased my worries somewhat, the second I picked up the Pom the flight style and wing shape were just so obvious.  

Other than these two skuas, 60 Manx Shearwater and a mixed flock of 35+ Dunlin and Sanderling were all I noted.  

And that's about it. Well except for a Red Kite east over the Donkey Sanctuary on 28th May...

Pic taken with my phone - it really was low!

Last Week

I've not got too much to tell of last week, due to two days of illness, two mornings of superb Dartmoor surveying and only about three hours of patch birding.

I had high hopes for Monday, but all I managed to squeeze out of the patch was a Hobby west over Bridge Marsh and this brief Greylag Goose with the Mute Swan flock there...

Patch bronze

Wednesday was spent on the moor, but I did have a spare ten minutes to look along the Estuary between this and work, and wow - it showed that Wednesday was a good day!  The heavy rain, fog and light SE wind had obviously encouraged waders to move about (and ground) - I was stunned to see a single flock of 90 Dunlin and 7 Ringed Plover on the Estuary.  Numbers like this are usual in the autumn on the Estuary, but only very rarely occur in spring, there has to be the right weather conditions. Although they were just Dunlin (I was disappointed there wasn't a smart Broad-billed Sandpiper in with them yes) they were great to see due to the incredible variation between birds.  All were in summer plumage, but the mantle colours varied from almost Curlew Sand-red to winter Sanderling-grey, and everything in between!  Overall size varied too, as did bill length, so the flock probably consisted of all of the regular occurring UK races; arctica, schinzii and alpina. I just wish I took some photos.

I find May wader days so so exciting - the 'rareometer' levels are sky high and there is so much potential.  Richard P managed to capture the magic with some footage from Charmouth the same morning, he had a single flock of 70 Dunlin, 25 Sanderling and 10 Ringed Plover, and he doesn't even have a river (well not a proper one anyway!). See HERE.

The following day was a bit of a let down, it was still misty and wet but the waders were just not moving - 11 Dunlin and three Ringed Plover were all the beach had to offer.  I did see a larger flock of small waders on Colyford scrape at high tide (about 40+ birds) but THE MOST frustrating thing happened...  I decided they were definitely worth a trudge out to Colyford hide, despite the rain the possibility of something like a male Kentish Plover made it a no-brainer.... Sadly though half way across Colyford Common I flushed a Peregrine off the marsh, which proceeded to fly across the tramline and straight over the scrape.  I heard a few Ringed Plover calls and when I made it to the hide there was nothing there at all... Arse.

And that's about it.  I'll end this post with a short video from Dartmoor, one of the perks of the early mornings and miles of walking...

More Rain Please!

The showers this morning did the trick in grounding some migrants around the Axe.  I decided to concentrate on the river valley and it was soon evident there had been an arrival of Blackcaps, Willow Warblers and Chiffchaffs.  It took a while until I found any quality, and when I did they were in the same hedgerow, the rare-looking hedgerow that runs north from Coronation Corner alongside the Estuary.  One was a Grasshopper Warbler that reeled briefly before vanishing, but the other was far more obliging - my first Lesser Whitethroat of the year...

As ever with my videos, if you click on that small cog-like symbol near the bottom right hand corner of the picture, and change the quality setting to 1080pHD, it will look a whole lot better.

For my previous birding outing you will have to turn back to last Friday, which was a very very wet day indeed!  The weather did the trick though as this proved our best wader day of this spring so far (which isn't hard as it has been dreadful!).  I clocked up 27 Dunlin, one Ringed Plover, 6 Common Sands, one Barwit (a gorgeous summer plumaged bird) and 19 Whimbrel.

Best of all though were the four stunning Yellow Wagtails on Bridge Marsh.  Spring Yellow Wags are a bit like Tree Pipits here, they are almost always just fly overs - so it was a real treat to see these.

Lastly, I just realised I never got round to thanking Mrs Bishop for finding the Montagu's Harrier the other day. A pity you got the ID a little wrong Brenda, but if it wasn't for you none of us would have seen it so many thanks from all of us here :-)

Beer Head

Up to Beer Head again this morning with the nets, joined by Peter for the first time this year - sadly I couldn't offer him an exciting session though.

It was soon evident the bushes were quiet, with just the odd Chiffchaff and Willow Warbler filtering through.  They could clearly see the nets as well which really didn't help - at one stage I watched a group of five Willow Warblers flitting along the bushes right towards one of my nets, but two went over it, two went around it and I caught just one!  

Two nets in two and a half hours saw 14 birds of six species ringed;

1 Blackbird

1 Blackcap

4 Willow Warbler

5 Chiffchaff

2 Blue Tit

1 Long-tailed Tit

Chiffchaff (left) and Willow Warbler (right).

With the clear skies I guess I wasn't surprised how few birds were in the bushes, but I was really surprised about how few birds were passing over.  I only noted five 'vis mig' birds overhead; two Swallows, two Meadow Pipits and.... well the and was a bit of a good one...a Short-eared Owl!

As can be seen from my video it was harassed by every Crow in Beer for a short while before it gained height and flew off south east across Lyme Bay.  What a lovely surprise, and one of the bonuses of having Beer Head as a ringing site :-).

Despite then spending the rest of the day at work, I still managed another year tick today. Whilst walking the dog around my estate tonight (about 20:30) I could hear a Grasshopper Warbler reeling from the edge of the marshes.  A few minutes later and I was stood right next to it - one of the best sounds of the bird world if you ask me. 

Some Nice Variety

Yesterday turned out to be a pretty decent day.  The only migrants about in quantity were hirundines (about time as I've only seen small numbers so far this year) with 200+ at Bridge Marsh during the morning, mostly Swallows but also several House and Sand Martins...

Was really hoping for a Red-rumped...

Although there wasn't anything else about in quantity yesterday I did have some nice snippets of quality, including my second Lesser Whitethroat of the year rattling away whilst watching these hirundines. Amazingly I have still not seen or heard a Common Whitethroat on patch this year, so to have two Lessers before any Commons is just weird. Sometimes I don't see any Lessers in an entire spring, compared with tens and tens of Commons. 

Just prior to this, I had a Grasshopper Warbler reeling for about twenty seconds lower down the Estuary near the Riverside workshops. Really thought I'd missed out on one of these skulkers this spring, they've been few and far between like many other passage species.  

I did Beer Head as well, but after flogging the eastern half of it I thought it was going to be a complete write off, the bushes were dead. When I reached the old Coastguard Lookout though a nice double whammy made it all better...

A fairly shy but very vocal male Redstart, only my second of the spring

This gorgeous male Whinchat, also my second of the year

I spent a lot of time with the Whinchat, it was a pity to leave him as he was such a stunner...

And now to today, which has been pretty disappointing.  I was up at 5am, and at Beer Head for 6am with my mist nets and poles. To me the weather looked perfect for a fall, the wind had switched round to the south west overnight, and was light, plus there was 100% cloud cover. I also checked some European satellite images last night which showed a high pressure sitting over the Med with virtually no cloud between us and southern Spain.

By 8:15 I had caught just three birds, two Chiffchaffs (both possibly local breeders) and a Robin. The only other grounded migrant I saw was a Sedge Warbler in full song - which was a bit of an odd one.  That was it for the bushes, pitiful and far from a fall. Two summer plumaged Golden Plover over low west were nice mind, with eight Whimbrel doing the same a little later. 

By this time last spring I had trapped and ringed 127 birds at Beer Head, including 76 Willow Warblers. The three birds I caught here this morning were the first three birds I've ringed up here this year.  I have tried, I've woken up at 5am on five mornings this month, but all sessions have been no good.  On three of these visits the net sites were completely blown out by an easterly wind (my rides are fairly sheltered from anything northerly or westerly, but exposed to easterly winds), on another thick fog and clear skies above deemed the session a fail before it begun, and the fifth attempt was today - when there just weren''t any migrants about.

The best sight of the morning was during one of the daily dog walks, when a flock of 16 Pale-bellied Brent Geese flew close west past the sea front...

Just about got them all in frame!

They flew past me at 09:52, I tweeted Dawlish Warren and texted Lee C, and later learnt Dave Jewell had them off the Warren fly in from the east then south at 10:27. Always love it when migrating birds are tracked, and it's really interesting to know it takes a Brent Goose flock about 25 minutes to fly just under 20 miles.

By the time they reached Dawlish they must have lost the 17th bird of the flock. Can you spot the Brent Goose-wannabe?

You don't fool me Mr Carbo

The Flood Gates Have Opened

Yesterday morning, most of Beer Head looked like this...

You could barely see your feet - let alone any birds!

Thankfully though, the eastern side of Beer Head was clearer, and this is where the birds were.  April 15th is 'Grasshopper Warbler day'. Almost every year we've had at least one on this date, and this years bird reeled for about ten seconds at the bottom of the Dell.  I, like others, always like to see Grasshopper Warblers, but I do find something quite magical about just hearing them. So often when your migrant searching in spring one will start reeling, then stop and just disappear in to thin air. They are almost mystical! And how many non-singing birds do we walk past!??

The other year tick here was a heard only Tree Pipit somewhere in the fog. Ian M saw it briefly later too in roughly the same place.  The colour came thanks to two cracking male Redstarts, these shared the bushes with 15+ Willow Warblers, 5+ Chiffchaffs, three Blackcap and a Fieldfare. It was also nice to get good views of a huge and pale Greenland (type) Wheatear.

After Beer Head I then had a walk around the equally foggy Beer Cemetery Fields.  It was mostly quiet here except for a small group of Willow Warblers accompanied by another fine male Redstart, at least five Blackcaps in the lane behind the cemetery, and a Siskin.

The low cloud/fog yesterday meant throughout the day there were large numbers of hirdundines feeding in the valley. Mostly Swallows but with several Sand and House Martins mixed in too.  I managed to see all three species from my house late afternoon, and at 17:50 had a very pleasant surprise when a Hobby powered through low north. I really love where we live :-).  I love it even more because I can walk to Black Hole Marsh in exactly four minutes. When the next mega occurs here that I'm at home for, it would be quicker for me to run/jog to it, than drive to it! Love it!

Anyway, this short walk was what I did this morning. I didn't get home til very late last night after a Devon Birds council meeting, so didn't fancy getting up early. This is why I didn't see a Velvet Scoter that flew past us at 7:40. But when I did emerge I had a great time at Black Hole Marsh.

It was really jumping with birds!  The bushes were alive with Willow Warblers...

A Chiffchaff could never look like this!  Willows really can be very striking

And in the reeds, my first Sedge Warbler of the year showed well before singing.  The highlight was on the marsh though, with a cracking male Yellow Wagtail amongst six Wheatears.  Sadly when the Wheatears moved off west, so did the Yellow Wag. In this picture they are four Wheatears and the Wagtail, can you spot them all...

The star bird is sadly facing the wrong way!!

Also on the marsh, a couple of Green Sands (looking stunning now) and my first family of Mallards...

There were 15 ducklings in all

That's probably all the birding for me for a couple of days. Although I do hope to spend an hour sea watching in the morning before I have to head off to another meeting.

Not The Day I Was Expecting

Normally, the evening before I have a pretty good idea what kind of birding I will be doing the following day. And last night I set the alarm for 6am with sea birds in mind. I was very wrong!

For some reason I woke up shortly after 4am today, and it was horrendous outside. Heavy rain and strong winds battering against my windows. When my alarm went off at 6 though, no rain, and much less wind. This, along with my interrupted sleep, encouraged me to get a little bit more sleep!

When I did get up, I sent Gav a text to find out what the sea was like. The response was mostly negative, so I headed out at 7:30 to check elsewhere.

The Estuary showed nothing new at all, so I headed to Black Hole Marsh. As soon as I stepped out the car I could hear several Willow Warblers singing, many more than I should be hearing! I wandered down the track towards the marsh, but was interrupted by a reeling Grasshopper Warbler in the field to the south. One of my favourite sounds of the spring - and our first of 2012. A look over the lagoon showed another 'first for the year', in the form of this Common Tern...

With two Black-headed Gulls

I walked back towards the car where I met Gav who had twitched the Gropper (they can be hard to find when you 'need' them). Whilst we were waiting it didn't make a sound, but another first for the year briefly popped up, in the form of a cracking male Whitethroat.

Next stop was the Beer Cemetery Fields, I grabbed my mist nets on the way up too. I shouldn't really have bothered with the nets, as it was really quite windy up there - although it wasn't a total waste of time as I did catch and ring three birds; Blackcap, Wren and Blue Tit.

It certainly wasn't a waste of time coming up here though! Two and a half hours produced;

2 Redstart (males - in the same area as each other)
1 Tree Pipit (flew low west calling at 11:15)
1 Grasshopper Warbler (reeling near the cemetery - it was real close but I never saw it!)
45+ Willow Warblers (probably many more)

One of the Willys

And I know you know what a Grasshopper Warbler sounds like, but here is a short video clip of the Beer Cemetery bird reeling...

I was out again this afternoon. Seaton Marshes produced ten Wheatears, Colyford Common another seven, and my first Sedge Warbler of 2012 was singing beside Black Hole Marsh.

Considering the date, and the weather, there are still very few hirundines about. I have seen a few Swallows about, but in past years, this weather on this date would produced several hundred hirundines in the river valley - and possibly even the first few Swifts. I wonder where they all are?

What a brilliant and very enjoyable day! It's so nice to see a decent spring fall. I spent a lot of time out yesterday too, and saw nothing of note all day! The only migrants I saw were a couple of lone Swallows. What a difference a day makes! I presume the weather over northern France was clear last night - they must have had one hell of a shock when they arrived in the UK!