Not A Nice Post To Write...

The stormy winter months haven't just been devastating for many people in the UK, but they have been for our seabirds too.

An arcitle on BirdGuides reveals that a survey during the weekend of 22/23rd February along the coast of the Bay of Biscay, France, showed 21,341 dead birds (mostly Puffins). On top of this, 2,784 ill birds were taken into care and fisherman were still reporting seeing carpets of dead birds floating at sea. Such disturbing news.

Along the Devon coast, Kev Rylands of the RSPB has said around 200 dead birds have been found. I know that south Dorset, particularly Chesil Cove, have had large numbers too, and Cornwall.  Wales is in the same boat now also and I presume Ireland is as well.  The true number of sea bird that have died, considering these numbers, and the fact most are probably still floating at sea, is scary. Must be around or above 100,000 birds surely?

Seaton beach sadly has had its share of this. Local birder Alan Bibby has found most of the birds, but I've been down a few times also keeping an eye on things.  Personally I've seen 16 dead birds; 10 Guillemot, 3 Razorbill, 1 Kittiwake, 1 Great Skua and 1 Manx Shearwater.  I know of a further four dead birds that have been found, including a Puffin. This selection shows how many different species have been affected.

And now, I'm afraid, some pictures...

Sadly many of the Guillemots, like this one, were in pristine summer plumage and looked in good shape (except for being dead obviously!).

A Razorbill.

A dead adult Kittiwake, this was the only bird I've seen with obvious oil.

This I found the saddest sight. Great Skua's are the bullies of the sea, a proper dominate pirate species. Not this one anymore.

A head shot of the Great Skua, such a powerdul bird.

A Manx Shearwater (which is still in my back garden!) - we usually see these gracefully gliding just above the waves.

Hopefully my next blog post will be a bit more positive...

A Little Treat

I was hoping this would be a post containing several photos depicting the chaotic scenes at Seaton this morning. The day that saw the town's worst flooding since 1974. But I've been up since half four and I'm afraid I just don't have the energy.  I just had to post about this little delight though...

A look along the Estuary soon after dawn showed two adult Kittiwakes resting on the water, here's one pictured (very distantly!) with a Common Gull...

Kittiwake on the right

They started to fly around a bit, and being such a scarcity on the Estuary I thought I'd try and get this species on the house list while I could.  So I went straight home to set the scope up in the bedroom, which I peered down for a few minutes at a time every so often. 

I can't see much river at all from my house, in fact during low tide I can't see any at all, just the air space above it. But when the river valley is flooded, I can see this much...

Still not much, and most of what I can see it partially obscured by trees. To be (almost) precise, the Estuary is about 1.900 km in length, and I can see roughly 150m of it, and of that small section, only half the width of it.

Several short watches revealed no Kittiwakes, and with the wind having dropped by late morning I figured they'd probably made a break for the sea.  I kept watching though, and at midday had my reward with a cracking adult Little Gull feeding close to the surface of the water.  I saw it several times from the bedroom over the next couple of hours, before I just had to go for a closer look from Axmouth...

It was superb to watch, feeding exactly like a Storm Petrel pitter-pattering over the surface of the water with incredible elegance and ease. What a cracking bird!!

More 'bedroom birding' later in the day revealed yet another house tick, a Med Gull. I really should have seen this species from the house long before today, as they probably fly past every day of the winter! I obviously haven't been looking hard enough when one has passed. It was an adult circling over Black Hole Marsh with Black-headed and Common Gulls at about 4pm.

And now people, with my head literally resting on my laptop's keyboard, it's time to sign off for the night. But expect a post crammed full of photos in the next day or two...

Wonderful Waders, Glorious Gulls and Sweet Swallows...

Black Hole Marsh just keeps getting better!  Still no rares, but waders on it this morning included several Black-tailed Godwits, Redshank, Common and Green Sands, 56 Dunlin, 24 Ringed Plover, one Little Ringed Plover, one Ruff and a Greenshank.

Part of the small wader flock

Amongst the small gulls Phil picked out a colour-ringed juv Kittiwake. Bit of an odd record, and I was a bit gutted I didn't see it from the house as it would have been a cracking house tick! Anyway, here it is...

My first juv Kittiwake of 2013. You can't see the rings but I've sent the details of (hopefully to the right place!)

Later on, another visit to Black Hole Marsh was mainly to have a look through the resting gulls on the Axe Estuary, and I soon picked out two juv Yellow-legged Gulls. One disappeared soon after I spied it, but the other showed well for ten or so minutes. It was interesting to see this bird had more white on the tips of the tertials than the 'classic' juv YLG...

An 'almost classic' juv Yellow-legged Gull

So the tertials may not be bang on - but everything else was. The most clinching feature visible on the above photo are the second generation mantle feathers.  Here's a closer look at them...

Two of them are very clear to see

First of all, notice the colour of them; The dark bits are almost black, compared with the lovely warm brown of the other mantle and wing feathers, notice the broad white areas near the tips too. Then there's the pattern of them; Lovely anchor shapes and nothing like the plain juvenile mantle feathers. Scroll up and have another look at the top photo again - can you spot them now?

So, next time you hear the term second generation mantle feathers, this is them! And this is what to look out for to absolutely clinch a juv Yellow-legged Gull at this time of year.

The other onithological action for me today was taking another look at one of my Swallow breeding sites. The second brood is well underway, although one nest just had eggs in. Another nest had four naked and blind young in, but a third nest had four larger juveniles in - which I ringed...

Cute!!

No Seawatching For Me

This week has seen two outstanding days of sea watching, for Devon and the patch. Gavin has been present when most of the stuff has flown past, so read his accounts of the sea watching antics HERE. Monday was the best day, and I only had chance for an hour out so headed down to Black Hole Marsh. Wednesday was the next best day, but I had a meeting in mid Devon from 10am so had no time for sea watching at all! Typical isn't it - if only Tuesday and Thursday were the two wet and windy days then I would have seen lots!

The numbers of Long-tailed Skuas have been the biggest surprise, with the patch scoring three this week. Again, Gav has a good write up of this on his blog, and although I missed all of these, I am more than happy with the two I've seen over the years. Actually, out of all the rare/scarce birds I've seen on patch, the adult Long-tailed Skua that graced the sea over Seaton Bay back in May 2006 for some reason has stuck in my head more than anything. I can still picture it now, and recall the exact chain of events and the expletives that were uttered! What a beaut.

Ok, so what have I seen this week...

My hour out on Monday at Black Hole Marsh did prove worthwhile, as a juv-type Garganey appeared in the middle of the lagoon amongst 60 or so Teal. As soon as I found it I sent some texts out as this species is a bit of a patch rarity, but before all the texts had sent, one bird out of all the c300 birds on Black Hole Marsh took off and flew low north...the bloody Garganey! Sodding typical. The in flight views though showed it was a male.

Also on the marsh was; 43 Blackwits, 42 Dunlin, 24 Ringed Plover, ten Green Sands, eight Common Sands, three Lapwing and the Spotted Redshank and Tufted Duck still.

On Tuesday I had a whizz round many parts of the patch, including Colyford Common and Marsh, the Estuary, the flood opposite Axmouth FC and Black Hole Marsh. This revealed a decent selection of birds - excellent for the Axe to be honest; three Lapwing, 26 Ringed Plover, one Knot, 44 Dunlin, four Snipe, c25 Black-tailed Godwit, nine Common Sands, 14 Green Sands, one Spotted Redshank, three Ruff, one Turnstone and a Kittiwake!

The Kittiwake didn't look well at all, and is still present today so it isn't looking good for it...

It doesn't look too bad in this pic though

On Wednesday morning, before I headed off for my meeting I had chance for a quick look over Black Hole Marsh. One of the first birds I saw after I got in the hide was a small stint with the Dunlin and Ringed Plover over in the 'Solitary Sand corner' of the marsh. It was soaked wet (there was very heavy rain) and remained distant and I had to leave for my meeting.I had to leave it as a 98% Little Stint!

Whilst away, it was confirmed, so on my return at 14:00 I quickly dropped in for another look. It was closer, but the weather was still dull and awful...

..hence this crap photo!

Again there was a good number of birds on the marsh including two Turnstone, and the Ruff and Knot still.

And that brings me to today. I was down Black Hole Marsh early again (yes, I am determined to get Spotted Crake on my patch list!)...

Very tranquil compared with yesterday!

There was a bit less variety on the marsh, but the Little Stint and three Ruff were still present, and a few more Blackwits present - 44. Still no Spotted Crake though!

Later on in the morning, a quick look around other sites in the river turned up the Garganey again. It was on flood water opposite Axmouth FC along with a load of Mallard and c20 Teal. It could be quite elusive at times in the long grass, but I'm pleased to say at least three other birders managed to twitch it successfully.

And to complete this post, on 7th August I saw two colour-ringed Great Black-backed Gulls from the tower hide. One was 0.AA8, and the other L:AP8...

Looking suitably monstrous - I do love Great Black-backs!

Well I've just heard back from Bruce Taggart - and it wasn't a channel-hopper as they usually are. This bird was ringed on Looe Island, Cornwall, as a pulli on 25/6/11. This is the first sighting of L:AP8 away from Looe.

Passage Over Land And Sea

I'll start with this morning's sea watch. There was no quality, but quantity wasn't too bad in conditions that weren't anywhere near as windy and the met office said they would be the night before!

Watching from the Spot On Kiosk 07:30 - 09:00 produced (all west):

7 Common Scoter
1 Red-throated Diver
162 Gannet
109 Kittiwake
2 Common Gull
78 auk sp.
1 Dunlin

The only other bird news I have for today is of the Whooper Swan still opposite Stedcombe Vale and 11 Lesser Black-backed Gulls, 14 Black-tailed Godwits and two Dunlin on the Estuary.

Yesterday I spent much of the day printing off descriptions - highly exciting stuff!

Wednesday though was a good day! I woke up to fairly clear conditions, so went up to Beer Stables and 'vis migged' 07:35 - 09:10. Dark clouds rolled in at about 9 which put a halt to most of the passage.

The highlight was a single Hawfinch over at 08:10; it flew west about 80/100m north of me - the light was perfect which made the bird look simply stunning. As usual for this site, it was only just above hedge-top height. My first during a visible migration watch anywhere ever! I was rather pleased :-)

Wood Pigeons were on the move too. Although they weren't moving in large numbers by any means, it was nice to see flocks of up to 200 flying over the valley and off west. In total I logged 1,290 birds.

Pigeon passage!

Other birds seen during this watch included:

3 Stock Dove
11 Skylark
4 alba Wagtail
15 Meadow Pipit
2 Rock Pipit
1 Redwing
48 Starling
104 Chaffinch
4 Siskin
3 Greenfinch
14 Goldfinch
4 Linnet
2 Yellowhammer
2 Reed Bunting

Won't have much birding time at all this weekend, but I understand we've got some cold weather coming - bring on those Waxwings!