Portesham Pallas's Warbler

I didn't need any convincing yesterday to go and see the Pallas's Warbler currently over wintering at Portesham in Dorset. Pallas's are my favourite of the 'regular' sibes, I saw several at Spurn and Dunge in the early 00's - some exceptionally well.  But in the ten subsequent years of birding this patch I have seen just one, that was in 2007 and for about twenty seconds!  So it was high time I saw another, even though seeing what in my head is a late autumn specialty, in March, could well play havoc with my inbuilt birding body clock!

It was actually dead easy. James Mc and I parked up in Portesham shortly before 10am, casually strolled up to where we thought we should go, and there it was...

Count the head stripes - that's a seven-striped sprite alright

Showing it's Wood Warbler-like white underparts

The yellow tones to the face also reminded me of Wood Warbler colours. Often looked bull-headed too.

In coming - I just love those stripes!

Check out it's arse! Surprised I managed this with my bridge camera.

What a stunning bird, and mind blowing views.  No stiff necks looking at tree tops, it spent virtually the whole time feeding at eye level, and for the twenty minutes we were there it remained in view for about 17 of those.  It was so easy to follow as all the trees and bushes were completely bare, and it shared the surrounding cover with only a couple of Robins, Dunnocks, one Goldcrest and a Chiffchaff (which looked huge compared to it!). It really seemed to love this bush, the first bush on the right...

It did move into the small copse to the west and across the track south of this bush. But it did seem to like this bush, there were plenty of small flies buzzing around it which may have explained why.

The rump really is amazing.  It is virtually impossible to see when perched, but the moment it flies it's like a light bulb. It's even obvious when you just glimpse it flitting about with your naked eye at a distance.

My advice to anyone thinking of going for this bird, go.

Here's a few short videos that I'm sure will tempt even the most stubborn...

I can confirm to you all that without doubt seeing a Pallas's Warbler is an excellent cure for the winter birding blues - almost as much as a male Northern Wheatear (they can't come soon enough!).

As we were Portland way, I couldn't leave without some diver and grebe action, so we headed to Sandsfoot Castle for a quick scan over a nice calm Portland Harbour...

Looking south to Portland

This proved a very worthwhile stop, as a scan from the Sailing Academy, and through some builders fencing a little way back east along the road, showed a pretty decent selection.  For us fairly loyal patch birders, Red-breasted Mergansers are exciting enough as they are scarce on our patches, it was great watching the males displaying. 

My previous visits here have shown the Black-necked Grebes to be in one or two pretty tight flocks, but today the 12+ present were spread out everywhere; a four, a few pairs and singles. Most were in or coming into summer plumage which was nice, unlike the four Slavonian Grebes - three of these were in winter plumage with the fourth just starting to get dusky down the front. There were stacks of Great Crested Grebes too, all of these were in the far north east corner of the harbour (where one of the Slavs was, another was towards Ferrybridge with two together in the middle of the harbour).

Four Great Northern Divers were all spread out singletons, but the closest diver was a stunning Black-throated Diver. It was quite a hefty one to be honest, looked quite thick-necked and bulky, so am pretty sure it's the one that was showing well from the southern shore of the harbour over the last couple of days.  Sadly my photos aren't quite as good as Pete's...

A blurry phone-scoped Black-throated Diver in awful light!

One fat bird!!

With work looming it was time to head back west. But on the way home we called in at Abbotsbury for a look over the Swannery...

The light wasn't too bad when I took this, but the sun soon came out which made viewing more difficult

We were really impressed with the amount of wildfowl here, heaps and heaps of Pintail in particular. All the Pochard were sat out on the bank probably wondering where their lunch was - no wonder they are so rare here now, they are clearly getting lazy! In contrast the Tufties were busy getting their own grub out on the water, and among these were the the two wintering Long-tailed Ducks and at least one and a half Scaup. I say one and a half because I know there's a hybrid ScaupxTuftie here, and I couldn't rule this out on one of the birds - probably because it was the hybrid.

As ever it's not just the birds that make a twitch, but the company. James M is an ace twitching partner as we are both as laid back and relaxed about it as each other - and neither of us actually like twitching!  Especially the crowds.  We really are bad twitchers, and will only twitch a bird if the chance of seeing it is up around the 100% mark, plus there has to be other birds around to see as well. In general we also have a similar taste in birds and what we think is worth going to see, well that's with the exception of big white things. James seems to think all egrets may as well be Little Egrets (just smaller or bigger versions), and all swans are Mute Swans just with different coloured bills...

A Born Again Twitcher?

A proper rarity today - I've been twitching! I'll be honest, twitching isn't my thing, I have nothing against those that do, it just isn't for me. I'm a bit of a loner birder to be truthful, and although I like driving, hours sat in a car for one bird doesn't really appeal to me.  There are two reasons though why I may overlook these negatives...

1/ Because I think the opportunity to watch the species in the field will give me some valuable experience if I was to find one in the future.

2/ Because I want to see it.

There's been two birds in the south west over the last couple of days that have been tempting me. The Brixham White-billed Diver attractive due to reason number two. I saw the Hayle bird, and that was one of the best birds I've ever seen!  What's not to like about a big Great Northern Diver with a rhino horn for a bill!

The other bird is the Brunnich's Guillemot in Portland Harbour, this tempting for reason number one.  It is a bloody rare bird too, one I never thought I'd get the chance to see in the UK.  Anyway, it didn't take much to turn today into a part twitching/part shopping day with Jess, and at 10:30 this morning we tagged onto the the end of the large crowd of birders/twitchers/photographers on the edge of Portland Harbour.  

Within a few moments, and without knowing when and where it was last seen, it popped up right in front of us!!

Then followed the expected small stampede of a group of photographers, all wanting to understandably get in line with the bird.  This proved quite funny to watch, as the bird travelled surprisingly long distances under water, and often only surfaced for a few seconds.  This meant that often by the time the photographers had reached the Guillemots position, it had gone back under!  Jess and I just stood still, and in the ten minutes we were there it surfaced about five times right in front of us, despite at times being out of view to the left, and very distant to the right.  So my advice is, pick your spot and stay there - your time will come...

 

 

I'm not sure where it has been for the past few days, but it spent the whole time we were there along the near shore, most of the time between us and the jetty pictured here (which had several people on it - not bothering the Guillemot at all!)...

You can see in the photo below the same jetty, inside the marina, with the mass water body of the main harbour behind. Really lucky that it's feeding inside the marina, imagine finding it, and the views you'd get, if it was elsewhere in the harbour! I've previously seen a Surf Scoter in this small part of the harbour too.

And the last shot from here, our last view of the Guillemot...

Then it was Weymouth time (and lunch time -  McDonalds for two!), with shopping interrupted briefly by a couple of Mediterranean Gulls...

And an opportunity for Jess to feed her favourite water birds, Coots...

 (I really don't know why she loves Coots so much, but she really does!!)

I then managed to wangle a five minute scan from Sandsfoot Castle (along the north shore of Portland Harbour). What a worthwhile stop this was with at least two Red-necked Grebes (one really close), 17 Black-necked Grebes (one flock of 14 and a trio) and at least three Slav Grebes.  The sea grebes are all pretty scarce on patch, so this really was a treat for me!

The view from Sandsfoot Castle

If we'd had more time I would have tried for the two white-winged Gulls on offer, but we had to return home mid afternoon.

So sat here tonight, can I say it was an unforgettable experience? Well no, not really.  At the end of the day it is an auk with an extra white stripe!  I'm sorry if that offends you, but come on, how often do you look at a winter plumaged Razorbill or Guillemot and go 'ooooohh - what a stunner!'. But if I ask myself whether I'm pleased to have seen it? Well the answer is most certainly yes.  

And my next question?  When can I fit in a trip to Brixham....

Off Patch And Off County

Had to go to Weymouth this morning, but was all finished here by 11:30. I wasn't due to start work until 5pm, so thought I'd make my way back to Seaton slowly...

First stop was the Sailing Club on the edge of Portland Harbour. It wasn't long until scanning over the waves revealed a lovely flock of six Black-necked Grebes, each one doing exactly the same as the others! Another two small Grebes popped up a little closer - a couple of very smart Slavs, and a little later, a third appeared even nearer to the shore. The 'crème de la crème' though was a stonking Red-necked Grebe diving amongst buoys to the east of me.....phwoar!!

Further scanning revealed a couple of Eiders and more Red-breasted Mergansers than you could shake a stick at! I was a little surprised by the lack of Divers, but the fine selection of Grebes more than made up for that!

Next stop was Ferrybridge, and as I was driving across the causeway, what I wanted to see was there...

Brent Geese!

I quickly set myself up and began scanning through them. On the first sift through three Black Brants and two Pale-bellied Brents stuck out like sore thumbs. But then, they all did this....

Oh crap!

Luckily, although a few small groups continued flying up the Fleet, most of them soon did this...

Yeah!

I could now find just two Black Brants and one Pale-bellied Brent though....

See what I mean about 'sticking out like a sore thumb!' Although this bird's collar is more striking than the Brents, it's not that thick...

....unlike this one! Just look at the collar on that beast - MASSIVE! I can see why you get so hooked on these beauts Brett :-)

Aside the Brents though - and oodles of Med Gulls (which makes our Estuary look pathetic!), there wasn't much else of note on show.

I made one last stop during the journey home - some lane somewhere where you can look over Abbotsbury Swannery. I just about picked out a couple of Scaup despite the awful light (one 1w drake, 1 fem; there were probably several more), but the highlight was what flew through my scope view....a stonking ring-tail Hen Harrier! It quartered over the fields between me and the Swannery before flying off west. I didn't get a photo of it, but Brett did yesterday - see HERE.

So, another enjoyable off patch foray. I'll have to watch myself, I'll be twitching next....