I've spent the past two mornings out at Horsey. The access road along to Horsey Gap car park has been quite good with plenty of Phylloscs, up to 3 Read Warblers and a couple of Pied Flycathers. The find of the day yesterday, was a Wryneck in Horsey Gap car park. It was flushed from the car park and flew into the bushes on the west side, but despite waiting around for a while it didn't show its face again. Tree Pipit and Yellow Wagtail were also nice.
A juvenile Rose-coloured Startling turned up at the south side of Horsey yesterday, although it's apparently been around further south for a few days. I decided to go and have a look at it today, so after having another (unsuccessful) look for the Wryneck and checking the north side of Horsey Gap, I headed south. There were lots of Northern Wheatears around the Nelson Head track (up to 15), 7 Yellow Wagtails flew north, Lesser Whitethroat numbers seemed higher (4 in total), 4 Redstarts and 3 Whinchats added to the diversity.
One of the many Northern Wheatears at Horsey.
I found the starling feeding in the brambles about 500 metres south of
the Nelson Head track. It was quite showy, but every time it flew it got
totally hammered by all the migrant Swallows in the neighbourhood.
I'd missed all the excitement of the previous 3 days, having been back in Stoke-on-Trent for the Bank Holiday, so Tuesday morning found me heading out to east Norfolk to see if I could find any 'left-overs' from the big fall which occurred over the weekend. I headed down the Nelson Head track and over to my little patch of bushes on the farmland south of the track, which I have permission to bird. This isolated patch of bushes, which has provided me with Great Snipe, Barred Warbler, RBF, Wryneck and R-b Shrike in the past didn't disappoint. The first thing I found was a Greenish Warbler. It perched above my head for a few seconds, just long enough to see a few field marks and then it took me an hour and a half to see it again. In the end it started singing and giving really good views, albeit still inside the bushes, making it impossible to photograph, but I did manage to record the bird calling and singing on video (sound only).
Crank up your volume and have a listen...
Also in the bushes, was a slightly more co-operative Icterine Warbler.
Icterine Warbler, Horsey, Norfolk
Icterine Warbler, Horsey, Norfolk
Icterine Warbler, Horsey, Norfolk
There were still plenty of common migrants around. Between the south side of Horsey and Waxham I must have seen about 40-50 Wheatears, 8 Common Redstarts, 5 Whinchats, 20 Willow Warblers, 5 Pied Flycatchers and 2 Spotted Flycatchers.
It was the Norfolk Records Committee meeting today, so I headed up to Cley for some birding in the morning before the meeting. I met up with Mark Golley and we headed for North Hide at Cley. One of the first things we saw was an amazing-looking leucistic Barn Swallow. It was almost totally white apart from some buff areas around its face and back. The other swallows and Skylarks gave it a bit of a hard time so it didn't hang around for long.
North Hide was quite good, with the best bird being a juvenile Red-necked Phalarope feeding not too far from the hide.
Red-necked Phalarope, juvenile
Red-necked Phalarope, juvenile
Red-necked Phalarope, juvenile
Red-necked Phalarope, juvenile
Red-necked Phalarope, juvenile
It was then down to Kelling Quags to look for Wood Sandpiper, of which we saw two. There were also a rather nice juvenile limosa Black-tailed Godwit which flew off before I managed to get some shots of it, plus some Ruff and Greenshanks.
Kelling Quags
Wood Sandpiper
Wood Sandpiper
Ruff - male at back, female at front
After the committee meeting, a few of us went to the Cley roost where there was a nice male Caspian Gull on Pat's Pool, plus a couple of Yellow-legged Gulls, about 50 Dunlin and one moulding adult Curlew Sandpiper.
