After spending Christmas Day in Norwich I headed back to my home city of Stoke-on-Trent for a few days between 26-29 Dec. Then it was back to Norfolk for some birding over the new year.
I spent an afternoon and a morning at Aqualate Mere (Staffs) where the new hide gives a good view across the mere and the big seed feeder right in front of the hide provides good photo opportunities to get snaps of Willow Tit, now a description species in Norfolk.
Common Buzzard, Aqualate Mere, Staffs
Willow Tit, Aqualate Mere, Staffs
Willow Tit, Aqualate Mere, Staffs
Willow Tit, Aqualate Mere, Staffs
Reed Bunting (female), Aqualate Mere, Staffs
Coal Tit, Aqualate Mere, Staffs
Back to Norfolk and I spent 30 Dec 11 on the North Norfolk coast with Mark Golley. After starting out at first light watching about 100 Red-throated Divers and 40+ Snow Buntings at Cley Coastguards, we headed up to Fakenham to look at the Great Grey Shrike that was mooted as being of the form homeyeri.
There's a good discussion of the bird on Martin Garner's website Birding Frontiers . An interesting bird and subsequent discussion from which I've learned lots.
Great Grey Shrike, possibly a homeyeri intergrade.
Great Grey Shrike, possibly a homeyeri intergrade.
It was then off to Titchwell RSPB to see a few things. The Coue's Arctic Redpoll was showing well by the visitors centre. A first-winter bird, a good view is needed to tell it from the couple of Mealy Redpolls in the same flock. A Water Rail was showing very well along the footpath ditch and a female Mandarin on the freshmarsh was a nice surprise. A couple of Greater Scaup, Spotted Redshank and a Bittern were nice additions to the list.
Water Rail, Titchwell RSPB, Norfolk
Water Rail, Titchwell RSPB, Norfolk
Shoveler (female), Titchwell RSPB, Norfolk
Common Redshank (left) and Spotted Redshank (right), Titchwell RSPB, Norfolk
Little Egret, Titchwell RSPB, Norfolk
Little Egret, Titchwell RSPB, Norfolk
Little Egret, Titchwell RSPB, Norfolk
Dark-bellied Brent Goose, Titchwell RSPB, Norfolk
Dark-bellied Brent Goose, Titchwell RSPB, Norfolk
Dark-bellied Brent Goose, Titchwell RSPB, Norfolk
I spent New Years Eve and 2 Jan around east Norfolk mainly looking at waterfowl. As the Ring-necked Duck had been showing well at Ranworth Broad I headed out and got good views of it near the visitors centre and then popped down to Buckenham Marshes to see the returning Lesser White-fronted Goose with the Taiga Bean Geese. It was fairly distant, but quite distinctive being the only White-front in the flock. I also headed up to Cockshoot Broad to take a look at the Ferruginous Duck and/or hybrid(s). There were 2 birds on the broad which later flew to the river where I got some nice photos of them.
Ring-necked Duck, Ranworth Broad, Norfolk
Ring-necked Duck, Ranworth Broad, Norfolk
Ferruginous Duck (right) and Ferruginous X Pochard hybrid (left) Cockshoot Broad, Norfolk
Ferruginous Duck Cockshoot Broad, Norfolk
Ferruginous Duck (right) and Ferruginous X Pochard hybrid (left) Cockshoot Broad, Norfolk
Ferruginous Duck (right) and Ferruginous X Pochard hybrid (left) Cockshoot Broad, Norfolk
Ferruginous X Pochard hybrid Cockshoot Broad, Norfolk
Ferruginous x Pochard hybrid, Cockshoot Broad, Norfolk
Ferruginous x Pochard hybrid, Cockshoot Broad, Norfolk
Ferruginous Duck (left) and Ferruginous X Pochard hybrid (right) Cockshoot Broad, Norfolk
Ferruginous Duck (left) and Ferruginous X Pochard hybrid (right) Cockshoot Broad, Norfolk
Ferruginous Duck (front) and Ferruginous X Pochard hybrid (back) Cockshoot Broad, Norfolk
Ferruginous Duck, Cockshoot Broad, Norfolk
Ferruginous Duck (left) and Ferruginous X Pochard hybrid (right) Cockshoot Broad, Norfolk
Ferruginous Duck (right) and Ferruginous X Pochard hybrid (left) Cockshoot Broad, Norfolk
Ferruginous Duck (right) and Ferruginous X Pochard hybrid (left) Cockshoot Broad, Norfolk
Ferruginous Duck, Cockshoot Broad, Norfolk
I ended the day with a trip to Martham/Heigham Holmes. There were about 200+ White-fronted Geese plus 16 Common Cranes feeding out in the pastures.
Quite a nice festive season really. The weather stayed nice for winter birding and we can now all look forward to the days getting slightly longer.
I headed out to Nelson Head first thing today. As on the north coast yesterday, lots of Blackbirds and a few Robins, but rather quite otherwise. I had a few Snow Buntings on Horsey Beach flying over the pupping Grey Seals and then headed back to the car. I had a quick scan along the dunes before I reached my car and to my delight saw a Red Kite moving slowly south. It dipped down behind the dunes a few times, presumably interested by seal placenta. Above it was a large falcon, presumably a Peregrine, which soared around and then headed off north.
I decided to go a little further north and headed off to Horsey Gap. Again it was a bit slow, but when I returned to my car I stopped to ID a small bird that had flicked up into the top of some sallows. It turned out to be a Chiffchaff, so I stood and watched to see if there was anything else in the area. It was then that I heard a light "tuck" call coming from a little further back in the bushes. The call reminded me of a Radde's Warbler that I'd heard a couple of weeks ago, but perhaps slightly harder. I headed into the bushes and after a bit of searching tracked down the call - Dusky Warbler! It gave me the run around a bit, proving VERY difficult to photograph, but I eventually got a few clear photos of it. I put the news out and when the first people came along to look at it (about an 90 minutes after I found it), I headed off to Cart Gap to look at a lovely flock of mixed Tundra Bean, Eurasian White-fronted, Graylag and Pink-footed Geese.
I great way to finish off the autumn!
Mark Golley and I headed out and spent all day in Burnham Overy Dunes and the west end of Holkham Pines. There was quite a lot to look at, but our hard work and persistence didn't pay off with a nice rare unfortunately. The tally of birds for the whole day was quite good though. 5 Shorelarks were the best find. They flew over calling and then looked to land out of sight in the dunes. Unfortunately, when we made our way over to where we thought they'd landed, they where nowhere to be seen. A massive Lapwing movement was taking place today. We had 1000+ birds all moving west during the day. Dave Foster from Whitburn also commented on the number of Lapwings he had over Tyneside today, so I guess they must be on the move big-time. One Lapwing in particular got the adrenalin running. It had white primaries and primary coverts (on both wings), the back looked paler and the whole bird looked smaller. But it was just a partially albino/leucistic Lapwing. Lots of migrant Blackbirds in Burham Overy dunes, along with quite good numbers of Song Thrush, Redwing, Robin, Linnet and Greenfinch. There were a few birds in Holkham Pines. 4 Chiffchaffs and 2 Blackcaps were the only warblers we saw all day, along with great views of a Firecrest and a group of at least 3 Waxwings flying west. There were good numbers of Lapland Buntings flying over all day. One flock of 11 birds was the most together, pushing the daily total to 25+ birds. The sea, which was quite choppy on our way out to Holkham was flat calm on our return, so it was quite easy to see a few Slav Grebes and a female Long-tailed Duck along with quite a few Common Scoter and Red-throated Divers.
There were lots of geese in the area, mainly Pink-feet and Dark-bellied Brents. There were some nice Pale-bellied Brents, but the 'best' bird was a Black Brant x Dark-belled Brent hybrid. On the more striking side of a hybrid, the bird had a good neck ring and very contrasting flank patches, but the back and belly wasn't dark enough for a pure Brant. The day was nicely capped-off by a flock of about 10,000 Pink-footed Geese that took off from fields near Docking, filling the horizon.
