All work and very little play

Due to a change of shift pattern at work I haven’t really been out much over the last month.  I did manage to escape to Kielder for a day at the beginning of March and even though the weather wasn’t ideal, I had some nice Goshawk displays.  The interesting thing though was the number of Ravens, with a total of seven or eight being seen at different sights throughout the day.

I also tried for Snow Bunting at East Chevington. Despite there being eleven reported the day before, I only managed to find a single female on the morning that I went.

The two Slav Grebes and the Black-Throated Diver on the North pool were also nice to see.

Last week I spent a couple of mornings watching the Redpoll coming to the feeding station at the North end of the North pool at East Chev.  Although there was a lot of variation in plumage, all were Lesser Redpoll.  One of the days I was there, the Mealies were reported just after I had left, although I think this was a case of confusing a couple of very pale Lesser Redpolls as Mealies.    

Nice bit of Rump!

The last two days I've paid a couple of visits to High Shincliffe in County Durham to see the Yellow-Rumped Warbler.  Yesterday the weather was dull and very cold and the Warbler mainly stayed in cover all morning, feeding on a fat filled coconut in the middle of the bushes.  So no real chance of any photos that day.

So with better weather today and word that the Warbler had been feeding on a coconut that had been placed more in the open I decided to try again this afternoon.

However when I arrived the Yellow-Rumped Warbler was still feeding on the coconut in the middle of the bushes.  Luckily, with only about twelve birders there, I managed to find a spot with a clear view through a hole in the branches and even more amazing was that my SX50 managed to focus on the bird.  So I was quite pleased to get a couple of record shots.

Playing Catch Up

Last week I had a trip ‘South of the water’ to see the Glossy Ibis at Boldon.  Then this week one turns up at Lynemouth, although every time I tried to photograph it in sunshine it disappeared to the far side of the field.  It just seemed to come near to the road in dull weather. 

I have tried for the Green-Winged Teal at Druridge Pools three times and still not seen it!  In the last week I have also tried for Waxwing at Jarrow and Lesser Whitethroat at Tynemouth and dipped on both. I did manage to fluke the Great-Northern Diver in the dock at Cambios.  I only stopped to see how much of the river you could see from there and right in front of me up pops the Diver. Which was nice.  

Bolam Lake

I had a trip up to Bolam Lake today to see if there were any Brambling still hanging around.  To the North of the main car park there were a few birds flitting around in the leaf litter, but a scan through them only produced Chaffinch, Great, Blue and Coal Tit. So I had a walk in that direction as it seemed to be where most of the birds were.  Scanning the Northeast corner of the country park it seemed like the ground was moving, it was alive with Brambling, there must have been a couple of hundred.  Unfortunately they were very flighty and never allowed me to get close.

But with the reach of my super duper SX50 I did manage a few photos of these superb little birds. Despite putting sunflower hearts on the wall in the car park I just couldn't attract the Brambling closer.  However it's always nice to get really close views of Nuthatch.

 

Once Bittern

I have spent the last two mornings at Gosforth Park watching Bitterns.  Yesterday I had four sightings of at least two Bitterns, all in flight.  Because of the good weather photographers were out in force.  

 

 

 

Today I headed back there because I thought in today’s duller weather there wouldn’t be so many big lenses around and I was right.  Today I saw at least three Bitterns moving around the reeds in front of the hide.  One was very vocal and seemed to be more dominant and chased the other ones away.  It’s nice to sit and watch these superb birds only five minutes drive from home.

A Stag ‘Do’

           As usual at this time of year I’m trying to tidy up my year list and pick up the birds that I really should have seen earlier in the year.  Two birds that were missing from my year list were Slavonian Grebe and Great Northern Diver.  So on Monday I headed up to Stag Rock to try my luck. 

On the sea, there were good numbers of Long-tailed Duck, maybe as many as fifty on view.  Just beyond the breakers, was a small flock of Eiders with a few Common Scoter and a single Velvet Scoter in with them.  I soon pick up one of my targets with a single Slav just off the end of Stag Rock which dived and then was never seen again!  I did pick out three or four Grebes, within the large flocks of Common Scoter North of Stag Rock, that looked a bit dull to be Slavs but they were very distant and I couldn’t say for definite what they were. 

Whilst trying to get some other birders onto another Velvet Scoter, I spotted a very dark looking Diver just off the rocks, so I dashed back to my car to get my scope and it was ‘target number two’, a superb Great Northern Diver, which then took off and flew North.  I managed to get the other birders onto it as it flew off towards Holy Island.

 

 

I then got greedy and tried for the previous days Glaucous Gull at Long Nanny, again with no luck.  I couldn’t resist seconds of the Lesser Grey Shrike though which performed superb as usual.  I can’t help thinking what will happen to this bird once the photographers get bored with it and stop putting mealworms out for it?